Can Hindi speaker understand Punjabi?

No. Except for few utterances in Punjabi which have gained popularity because of the songs or dialogues in the hindi movies, a Hindi speaker won’t be able to understand the language.

Are Kashmiri and Hindi mutually intelligible?

Both are mutually intelligible at the conversational level and all it takes is knowledge of the Devanagari script and some Sanskrit words for an Urdu speaker to become a Hindi speaker. It is for this reason that the government in Jammu and Kashmir made Urdu the official language of the State.

Is Hindi and Gujarati mutually intelligible?

Even Hindi’s sister languages Marathi, Gujarati, Punjabi, Bengali etc are not completely mutually intelligible with Hindi. You can think of the differences between them as being similar to the differences between French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese etc.

How is Gujarati different from Hindi?

They’re quite comprehensible. Most native speakers of Hindi can understand Gujarati well, whereas almost all of native Gujarati speakers can converse well in Hindi. There are a few notable differences in script and some rooted words, but that doesn’t comprise much of the vernacular today.

How similar is Hindi and Marathi?

Marathi and Hindi both derive from Sanskrit and are written in the same script (though Marathi also used to be written in a cursive script called Madi). Hence, they do have lots of similarities. Gramatically, I would say that Marathi is more complex than Hindi, and uses more sounds too.

Are Marathi and Hindi mutually intelligible?

Marathi is somewhat similar to Hindi and Urdu in structural language but not fully mutually intelligible. Its alphabet is the same as Hindi though. Telugu and Tamil are both dravidian languages but are not mutually intelligible apart from some shared nouns and adjectives.

Can a native Hindi speaker understand Punjabi and Marathi?

I am native Hindi speaker who has traveled and lived in other states. If a Hindi person has never interacted with Punjabi, Marathi, Gujrati, Bengali, Kashmiri, Oriya, he/she will probably wont understand any words. The dialect and accent varies a lot. These languages have different scripts.

Which Indian language is not spoken in all parts of India?

But still there is not a single Indian language that is spoken across its length and breadth. Hindi is spoken by a majority of North Indians, but it is not a popular means of communication in the southern part of India. Similarly, South Indian languages such as Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam are not understood by the people of North India.

How much of Punjabi can a Hindi person understand?

Punjabi songs are very popular in Hindi movies so I think a Hindi person understands 40\% of Punjabi. There are Farsi words in both Hindi and Punjabi. Marathi is written in same script as Hindi so if you visit Maharashtra you will start understanding 30\% Marathi in few days. Bengali and Oriya are similar.

Why is English the official language of India?

India was a British colony until 1947, and English is still an official language (although Hindi is the national language spoken by most Indians). English is the language of instruction in many cities and schools. India has the 3rd largest population of people speaking English as their first language (after the US and the UK).