Lexical retrieval is a fascination phenomenon in multilinguals as each language the multilingual knows or masters would compete for lexical selection. This study investigated lexical retrieval across three languages Kannada, Hindi, and English in young balanced multilinguals using a conditioned naming test specially designed for the study. A total of 40 nouns with a colour dot associated with the target.  Based on the colour of the dot (red for Kannada, blue for English, and green for Hindi), the participants required to these nouns in the stipulated language.  The results showed that the median percentage scores of 71% for Kannada, 67.34% for Hindi, and 77.65% for English. Statistic (Friedman’s test) revealed significant differences in lexical retrieval between Hindi and English, and Kannada and English, while there was no significant difference was found between Hindi and Kannada. Further Error analysis was carried out and it demonstrated that participants frequently used English to name the pictures presented with a dot requiring them to name in Hindi and Kannada. These findings suggest that proficiency alone may not determine the direction of lexical retrieval but the exposure also matters. Linguistic factors like the word frequency influenced the word retrieval.  Better performance observed in English may be attributed to a primacy effect. This study emphasises on complexities involving the multilingual lexical retrieval, this further highlights the need for further exploration of cognitive mechanisms dwelling into language competence.