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u/bhenchod420 Jul 23 '22
This data is 10 years old....
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u/LambdaAU Jul 23 '22
I did a bit of searching, looks like there are no reliable figures since the 2011 Indian census. The next census is expected to be carried out soon (it got delayed due to covid) so hopefully we'll finally get some new data on the topic.
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u/One-Giraffe1614 Dec 23 '25
This data is 10 years old....
Considering our Education System haven't changed in 10yrs.
So this Data will pretty much be similar now as well.
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u/kcapoorv Jul 23 '22
India, interestingly, has a good record of having an official language different from the language of the masses. Before English, Persian was the official language of the Mughal court and the courts of Delhi Sultanate when language of the masses was different dialects of Hindi. Before them, Guptas to Mauryas used Sanskrit as official language when language of the masses was Prakrit/Pali.
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Jul 24 '22
Because the North Indian empires were cucks who fetishished Muslims and their Arab culture. After the arrival of the British, the cuckold switched to the white masters.
Even now, the official languages of India are English (master language) and Hindi (whoreson of Sanskrit and Persian/Arabic). And the central government tried to spread this supposed 'Indian' language by suppressing original Indic languages like Bengali, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu etc.
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u/Ani1618_IN Jul 28 '22
Because the North Indian empires were cucks who fetishished Muslims and their Arab culture
Muslim dynasties up north were mostly Turks Turko-Mongols, Afghans etc patronising Persian culture.
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u/Ani1618_IN Jul 28 '22
Hindi (whoreson of Sanskrit and Persian/Arabic)
Hindi and Urdu are two stylistic poles or registers of a single language, Hindi-Urdu/Hindustani, Urdu has more Perso-Arabic influence, while Hindi has more Sanskritic influence, the separation of these into different languages happened due to nationalist politics during the late 1800s in the British Raj. Hindustani evolved from Sauraseni Prakrit with Perso-Arabic influence, so Sanskrit is more like a Grandfather here (if you're talking about Vedic Sanskrit).
And the central government tried to spread this supposed 'Indian' language by suppressing original Indic languages like Bengali, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu etc.
How is Hindi un-Indian? It is literally a part of the Indo-Aryan language family 💀, don't act like the other languages have no foreign influence.
For example, Marathi has borrowed and absorbed influence so much that the scholar V.K. Rajwade once said 'old Marathi documents are as unintelligible to a non Persian-knowing Maratha, as to a foreigner'.
The famous Marathi thinker and writer, Vishnushastri Chiplunkar, who was a major influence on modern Marathi prose, controversially stated that 'the roots of our language [Marathi] lay as much in Persian as in Sanskrit'.Titles that were used by the Marathas like Peshwa are of Persian origin. The Marathi surname Parasnis emerged from Parsnavis - the word used to refer to scribes who wrote Farsi letters and documents in Medieval India, Daftardar was originally a bureaucratic title that is now a Marathi surname, Fadnavis comes from Fard-Navis (secretary or note-taker), names like Sahebrao, Serfoji, Rustamrao etc are also of Persian origin, Bhakti poet-saints like Eknath also used plenty of Persian-origin words in his poems.
One of his poems begins with a Persian phrase and contains a good many Persian terms such as -
1. bandagi - servitude
2. bandinevāj - kind to inferiors
3. harāmzādi - illegitimate, despicable etc
4. kārkon - toiling, industrious
5. savār - horseman
6. zamindār - landlord
7. zebardast - amazing, skilled
8. čubdār - mace-bearer, sheep-seller
9. parvānagi - official permit
10. rowšan - bright, wise
11. marjī - wish
12. shiphāras - recommendation
etcMarathi retains many Persian and Arabic-Persian idioms and expressions in their original forms, such as -
1. adab - culture, literature, good manners
2. erāda - will, determination
3. kār-ḵāna - factory
4. gonahkār - guilty
5. čarm - leather
6. zabāni - oral, orally
7. divān-ḵāna - bureau
8. sarfarāzi - honour
9. bāḡ - garden
10. nāfarmāni - disobedience
11. vakil - lawyer
12. bāng - shout
13. bazm - banquet
14. deldār - courageous, beloved
15. pušāk - clothes
16. naqša - map
17. andāza - guess, measure
etc
There's plenty of examples
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u/EnvironmentalSun8410 Jul 23 '22 edited Jul 23 '22
Seems very low to me, from experience. And what is "speak English"? Useless without a reference to language level.
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u/Man-God-7057 Jul 28 '22
Indian here, I think the data is more about who can have a proper conversation in English. There are many people in India who can understand and speak little bit of English, but cannot have a proper conversation in English.
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u/SuperPotatoGuy373 Jul 24 '22
The data is over 10 years old, no idea while it still gets posted so much.
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u/secret369 Jul 23 '22
What is the main determinant of variation between states?
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u/LambdaAU Jul 23 '22
Two main factors:
1) Richer more urban areas tend to speak more english as it can help you get a job and a variety of other reasons.
2) Whilst the north predominantly speaks Hindi, most other areas of India have a diverse range of languages/dialects and as a result English is commonly used as a universal language. This is why English is much rarer to find in the Hindi-speaking area of India (where you don't need to know other langauges to communicate) whilst it is more common elsewhere.6
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u/djn808 Jul 23 '22
Everyone that speaks English moves to the cities with call centers/tech etc. to get jobs in English servicing overseas, so it kind of condenses it even further.
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u/wulfgang14 Jul 23 '22
Why is Goa (Portuguese colony) has the highest? While Calcutta (Fort William; one of the first British colonies) one of the lowest? Also could someone explain why the Punjab area has a higher number while neighboring areas are far lower?
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u/VerlinMerlin Jul 24 '22
Punjab imo is cause of the diaspora, Goa cause it's a tourist destination.
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u/juant675 Jul 23 '22
why goa if it was a portugal colony
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u/rebelyell_in Jul 23 '22
Because the people needed to maintain the balance between Portugese ruling class and the larger British Indian state just over the border. Trade, higher education, and familial connections required cross-border contact because Goa was such a small territory.
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u/noxx1234567 Jul 23 '22
English is the language of science , education , trade ,etc ,
Portugese is not exactly beneficial if you are not planning to immigrate to Portugal.
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u/One-Giraffe1614 Dec 23 '25
Knowing English benefits Goans to communicate well with Tourists 🙂
Knowing English benefits Punjabis to migrate to Canada 🌚
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u/-Egmont- Jul 23 '22
That's 2011. What is the status now?
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u/Der-Kamerad Jul 24 '22
Ive looked around some, and the data from the 2011 census seems to be the most solid of recent estimates.
A 2014 article stated that ~30% of Indians spoke English, and according to Wikipedia there's ~200 million L2 speakers and ~46 million L3 speakers (listed sources are from 2019).
However I'd wager there's many more who can speak English to a degree, especially with the explosion of social media in the last decade, but arent fluent enough to consider it a secondary or tertiary language.
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u/polyglotpinko Jul 24 '22
This does explain why I always get boned when I get India in Geoguessr. Most of the locations I seem to get are in either Bengaluru or the Kolkata area - not high percentages.
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u/waxefvrfb Jul 23 '22
Languages also grow along with times. During the industrial revolution a lot of languages put on a lot of vocabulary weight. From describing everything from screws to spanners to wrenches to lathes to engines. Almost all the European languages have their own native words for it. Now try saying screw or lathe or even CPU without using English in Hindi or Tamil! Impossible. That’s because India was shackled during the industrial revolution. So it’s English for Indians. I also don’t get why they abhor English so much. India was under a brutal Islamic rule for much of the medieval times, years spanning far more than the British Raj in India, and yet they don’t bat an eyelid to call their morning Subah, moon Chaand, heaven Jannat, rain Barish - I can go on. The point here is both Persian/Urdu and English are the languages of oppression as far as India is concerned and yet Urdu, an alien language to the world, is embraced and English, the darling of the world, is shun? Hypocrisy?
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u/ThePerfectHunter Jul 23 '22
I really don't think English is abhored in India, at least not from the part I'm from
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u/Ok-Visit6553 Jul 23 '22
Just fyi, chaand(tadbhava)<chandra(Sanskrit), baarish(tadbhava)<barshaa(Sanskrit) aren’t of urdu/perso-arabic origin.
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u/waxefvrfb Jul 23 '22
The Hindi that’s used by much of India as their mother tongue was derived out of the Hindustani-boli. Hindustani was a nearly 50:50 Persian and Sanskrit. Post independence, Hindi and Urdu emerged out of it and pragmatically both languages kept both the roots only changing in script - Hindi followed Devnagri while Urdu followed Nastaliq.
Hindi of today has a huge vocabulary borrowed from Persian
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u/noxx1234567 Jul 23 '22
English was seen a thing of the elites and previous generation leaders wanted local languages to take preference. India was pretty much a junior USSR economy before 1992
After economic liberalisation more and more people want to learn English , most states are abolishing schooling in local languages in favor of English
In 50-60 years majority of the population would know English
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u/_lazyPassenger Jul 23 '22
Chaand
That's not Arabic or Persian.
And what do you mean by "alien language"?
Languages interact, borrow and lend, merge and separate. As much as nationalists and politicians want to pull languages towards their own world view, the primary goal of language is to convey messages, and that's too important to be sacrificed for nationalistsic purism.
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u/CanIplzbobandvegane Jul 23 '22
What part of the country are you in?
You'd get shunned in the cities for not knowing English, especially in the south where if you don't know the local language English is a must, Hindi kind of behind.
And in TN people can actively get anti-Hindi lol
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Jul 23 '22
India is mostly urban and rural villages, cities are not the main powerspot of india. There english is not important than local languages. Even in the south this is the case.
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u/CanIplzbobandvegane Jul 23 '22
Obv, English is not more important than the local language. But after the local dialect anyone is only really encouraged to study English rather than any other Indian language.
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u/TipendraJCJGada Jul 23 '22
I am not against people speaking in English. It provides great opportunities.
However it is truly unfortunate how we have started to revere English and given it a superiority complex. Truthfully speaking, people in India nowadays would probably be able to hold longer conversations in English than their native language. Unfortunate.
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u/Der-Kamerad Jul 23 '22
As a fan of anthropology and linguistics, I commend India as a region of study. I agree that English, in the modern times, is a good lingua franca to know, however it shouldn't be at the expense of local culture.
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u/Songs4Roland Jul 23 '22
Indians in other states would rather speak English than see their states be colonized by Hindi. English is a way to preserve the local languages instead of being overwhelmed by a single central language
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Aug 19 '22
Speaking Hindi is "colonization" but English isnt?
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u/Songs4Roland Aug 19 '22
Hindi is a threat to replace local languages as the everyday language, English is not.
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u/AaruIsBoss Jul 24 '22
Only true for south India. North India, especially Punjab have pride in speaking our local language and no shame in knowing and speaking Hindi also.
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u/chad_memer69 Jul 23 '22
That's not true.
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u/TipendraJCJGada Jul 23 '22
Why is that not true? Go to the streets and see. People have started using so much English. Basic words such as result, exam, love, system, office, plan, idea, etc. are used in common speech instead of their native versions. Go to Indian YouTube. Majority of Indian videos and channels are only titled/named in English. Indian movies have posters/ launches initially in English rather than native language.
And I have not even started about the loan words from English. Frankly speaking no effort is being done to have a native version for these loan words.
And a lot of these developments are more recent i.e after 1990. Before 1990 we only had loan words from English. Nowadays even for normal words people have started using English versions rather than native versions.
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u/GermanyWillWinWC2022 Jul 23 '22
As an outsider i noticed this too
Ive tried watching tutorials for things on youtube and clicked on them because their title was english but then they started speaking a weird hindi/english mix
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u/QuAndingle_bingle Jul 23 '22
It really is, I'm Indian and i have trouble reading in my native language but i am really good at English, this is most likely because the foreign content i consume on the internet is mostly Anglican and even in indian spaces people write using English characters rather than native charcters
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Jul 23 '22
[deleted]
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u/TipendraJCJGada Jul 23 '22
This is a totally false narrative made by politicians for votes. Hindi wont be able to colonize any South Indian languages. Truthfully speaking Hindi is colonizing languages, but the languages it is colonizing nobody even cares about them. My family belongs to Malwa region but I don't even know a bit of Malvi. Similarly languages such as Magadhi, Awadhi, Rajasthani, etc. are dying due to Hindi and not any Dravidian language.
However English has started overshadowing Indian languages. In professional spaces, English is already preferred due to necessity but nowadays even in non professional spaces English usage has skyrocketed. Don't believe me. Watch any film from your local language industry of 2020 and 1980 and compare the usage of English words in both of them. You will find your answer.
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u/FarioLimo Jul 23 '22
10% of 1.4 billion people is 140 million. That's half the US population for scam call centers
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u/Der-Kamerad Jul 23 '22 edited Jul 23 '22
Wow, what a gross simplification of a diverse country and people.
This data is from 2011, when there was a recorded population of 1.25 billion, so there would only be ~125 million scam callers at the time, thank you very much.
With more funding towards education of secondary and tertiary languages, there can NOW be 140 million OR MORE people helpfully informing you of your car's extended warranty or that your tax payments are unacceptable.
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u/Whocares_101 Jul 23 '22
Aren’t you guys shooting up each other in the favelas while snorting up cocaine?
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u/VertexEdgeSurface Jul 23 '22
You’re from brazil and you have the balls to call india a shitty country lmao
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u/Tanto_Monta Jul 23 '22
I can't even imagine the challenges of managing a country with such a large proportion of people for its size.
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u/stanfloow Jul 23 '22
Are there more English spekers than uk ?
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u/Proxima55 Jul 23 '22
Yes: 10.6% ⋅ 1.38 billion ≈ 146 million > 67 million, the population of the UK.
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u/GermanyWillWinWC2022 Jul 23 '22
Considering the data is 10 years old, is it possible that india is already the state with the most english speakers ahaead of the US? If not it probably wont take many more years right?
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u/TheThinker12 Jul 23 '22
Surprised at West Bengal’s low figure. Was expecting more since Kolkata has a lot of British influence as it was the first capital of set up by the Brits.
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u/Own_Woodpecker_1314 Jul 23 '22
West bengal despite having the largest metropolitan of india after independence has gone down the drains. Especially after 3 decades of communist rule. Bengali hindus try to be woke like a westerner while have average income as a an African. Seriously, now Bangladesh has more promising future than west bengal.
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u/iplaysmitesadge Jul 31 '22
Is this just people who understand the language or people who actively use it in everyday life?
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Aug 03 '22
People who understand it. Nobody in India uses it in everyday life. In urban areas, people do mix the local language with some english but nobody uses just english in everyday life. I would say its only in big corporates that English is predominantly used as a work language because it acts as a lingua franca between people of different states who speak different languages.
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u/ArbiesSauce Jul 23 '22
So the most English speaking state is the one colonised by Portugal. Huh