> They have done it for a century now. Cultivating hatred for English in
> the masses to deprive them
> the access to the world classics, literature, understanding as well the
> scientific and technological developments that are taking place in the
> world or that have already come into existence.
LBOsters may (or may not) realize the structural importance of a lingua franca, given South Asia's sheer linguistic/cultural/political complexity. Here are the latest numbers for India's largest 20 languages (speakers are listed in millions):
Language Native speakers % Indian population Hindi 366 34.9% Bengali 69 6.6% Telugu 69.6 6.6% Marathi 68 6.5% Tamil 46 4.4% Gujarati 46.1 4.4% Kannada 35.3 3.4% Malayalam 35 3.3% Oriya 32 3.0% Urdu 30 2.9% Bhojpuri 26.3 2.5% Panjabi (Western) 18 1.7% Assamese 15.3 1.5% Panjabi (Eastern) 14 1.3% Marwari 13 1.2% Chhattisgarhi 11.5 1.1% Deccan 10.7 1.0% Sindhi 10 1.0% Santali 6.1 0.6% Kashmiri 4.5 0.4%
-- DRR