In December 2009, during the First Vishwa Tulu Sammelan organized at Ujire-Dharmastala, then Karnataka Chief Minister B. Efforts are being made to include Tulu in the 8th Schedule of the Constitution. Tulu is not an official language of India or any other country. In Tamil, thuli means 'drop of water' thulli means the same in Malayalam. In Kannada, there are words such as tuLuku meaning 'that which has characteristics of water' and toLe. Other water-related words in Tulu include talipu, teli, teLi, teLpu, tuLipu, tulavu and tamel.
Tulave ( jackfruit) means 'watery' in Tulu. Linguist Purushottama Bilimale (ಪುರುಷೋತ್ತಮ ಬಿಳಿಮಲೆ) has suggested that the word tulu means 'that which is connected with water'. Gururaja Bhat specified in Tulunadu (a research book) that tuluva originated from the word turuva ( ತುರುವ), where turu means 'cow' and refers to the place dominated by the yadava or cowherd ( ತುರುಗಳೇ ಪ್ರಧಾನವಾದ ನಾಡು ತುಳುನಾಡು). The Tulu language originates in the southern part of India. It descends directly from Proto-Southern Dravidian, which in turn descends directly from Proto-Dravidian, the hypothesized mother language from which all Dravidian languages descend. Tulu belongs to the southern branch of the family of Dravidian languages. The Epic of Siri and the legend of Koti and Chennayya belong to this category of Tulu literature. The Tulu language is known for its oral literature in the form of epic poems called pardana. However, in modern times the Tulu language is mostly written using the Kannada script. Two Tulu epics named Sri Bhagavato and Kaveri from the 17th century were also written in the same script. The various medieval inscriptions of Tulu from the 15th century are in the Tulu script. Apart from Tulunadu, a significant emigrant population of Tulu speakers is found in Maharashtra, Bangalore, Chennai, the English-speaking world, and the Gulf countries. Non-native speakers of Tulu include those who are residents in the Tulunadu region but who speak the Beary language, the Havyaka language and also Konkani and Koraga as their mother tongues. A significant number of native Tulu speakers are found in Kalasa and Mudigere taluks of Chikkamagaluru district.
Tulu is the primary spoken language in Tulu Nadu, consisting of the Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts in the western part of Karnataka and the northern part of Kasaragod district of Kerala. For example, it has the pluperfect and the future perfect, like French or Spanish, but formed without an auxiliary verb. Separated early from Proto-South Dravidian, Tulu has several features not found in Tamil–Kannada.
There is some difficulty in counting Tulu speakers who have migrated from their native region as they are often counted as Kannada speakers in Indian census reports. The 2001 census had reported a total of 1,722,768 native speakers. The Indian census report of 2011 reported a total of 1,846,427 native Tulu speakers in India. The native speakers of Tulu are referred to as Tuluva or Tulu people and the geographical area is unofficially called Tulu Nadu.