English vs Hinglish

The other day I was surprised to see a reference to Hinglish in the Economist (July 4, 2026, p.37).

Having traveled across India, I’m no stranger to Hinglish (a blend of Hindi and English words).

Now for a bit of introduction to India’s language complexity: Stand on any street corner of any Indian city and, amid the incessant din of auto honks, children’s yells, canine barks, hawker cries and adult curses, you’ll hear a babble of tongues.

Since India is a melange of languages, Hindi, Tamil, Urdu, Punjabi, Telugu, Oriya, Kannada, Bengali, Marathi, Bhojpuri and English are only a few of the languages that’ll mercilessly assault your eardrums every time you step out.

Hindi is widely spoken in North India. It’s one of the two official languages of India, the other being English. Millions of Indians in the more developed, southern part of the country are averse to what they see as the imposition of Hindi on non-Hindi speaking people.

Each of the southern states is home to a separate language: the Tamil language dominates in Tamil Nadu; Kannada in Karnataka; Malayalam in Kerala; and Telugu in Andhra Pradesh and its sibling, Telangana.

Because of the higher literacy rate in the south and diversity of languages in the region, many South Indians have embraced English as the lingua franca for interaction with people from other states. So you are likely to encounter a higher quality of spoken and written English in South Indians.

While North Indians are more likely than not to converse in Hindi, they are not completely immune to the siren song of English.

Over the last 300 years, people in North India have willy-nilly made way for inroads of English into Hindi, creating a hybrid patois called Hinglish.

Take a look at some oft-heard examples of Hinglish in India:

• Chai break
  Meaning: Tea break
• Delete karna
  Meaning: to delete something, usually online (a text message, e-mail, etc.)
• Party sharty
  Meaning: party and similar fun
• Tension mat lo
  Meaning: don’t get tensed
• Selfie lena
  Meaning: to take a selfie
• Full paisa vasool
  Meaning: Total value for money; a phrase often used by teens to express satisfaction after watching a new movie featuring their favorite star
• Download karna
  Meaning: to download something
• Shift hona
  Meaning: to shift house or office
• Rickshaw-wallah
  Meaning: rickshaw driver
• Scene kya hai?
  Meaning: what’s the plan?
• Fit hai
  Meaning: It’s good, acceptable
• Chill maar
  Meaning: relax
• Like karna
  Meaning: to click like on social media

By the way, Hinglish is not the same as Indian English or loanwords. We’ll save that discussion for another day.