Why do a lot of Indians who can't speak English properly have such a strong inferiority complex and/or hatred for the language?

What you are experiencing is not inferiority complex but a way to tell you that you are using the wrong thing at the wrong place. IMO, English is given undue respect in India then it deserves. Statements like "movement to spread awareness about the English language and its role in society" very well signifies where your thinking stands. India has around 12.16% of its population as English speakers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_English-speaking_population) which is about 1/8th of the total population, what role do you think it can play in our society? Indian society is characterized by its languages, religion, architecture, food and customs, English is no where part of it, so get your facts rights before making such baseless statements. It was a language that was inherited from our rulers (read the British) and continued to rise in popularity and existence since the south Indian states refused to adopt Hindi as the official language (which is a valid point since only 41% of population is Hindi speaking) and hence English was accepted as an official language but in no way is it a part of our history, culture or any such thing which constitutes society, What gave rise to the popularity of English was globalization. Suddenly with an influx of foreign MNC's and exodus of NRI's from India led to this thinking of English being the language of educated (which is a completely wrong notion). Yes, it's the preferred way of office communication, and to survive in corporate today, you need to have average to decent English communication skills but that in no way signifies that it should takeover your senses and become a preferred way of life, since, you were born Indian and were gifted a mother tongue. Learn to use your mother tongue or an Indian language at places where it's not necessary to use English since you carry an Indian passport and were born an Indian. Also, look at countries which are more developed then we are (Read China, France, Germany, Switzerland, Spain etc.), they all converse in their mother tongue. you will never find 2 Chinese or 2 Germans speaking to each other in English unless and until it's a formal setup. We have just overrated English education a lot and hence we started counting it as an indicator for skills and competence. Yes, there are people who suffer from Inferiority complex because of not being able to communicate in English effectively, but a primary reason why we have reached that point is because Indians (Read 12.16% of English speaking Indians) have substituted education for English skills and hence these non-english speaking people suffer due to such behavior and when they see people trying to speak English at places where it is not required at all, they get agitated. Also, there are many who are comfortable/like using their mother tongue/other regional language for informal communication and if you go and try to speak in English, it does come out as show off. So, my advice will be to restrict yourself to speaking English at places where it is really required. Its okay to speak English among friends, if all of you like it, as a primary means although its not all right to speak English at places where you know another language that people around you are speaking in majority.

I personally feel comfortable speaking in Hindi. So if I am amongst my friends who understand Hindi I prefer Hindi. May be the way I was brought up. But I think I feel a sense of connection, a sense of informality (in a good way) when I speak in Hindi. When I speak in English, it has an officious tone. If the folks whom you are conversing with are not good at English and if they know you know Hindi or any other local language, it is natural for them to expect you to speak in the local language. And this is because they are comfortable with it. You are also assuming that Doctors and Engineers from top colleges should always speak English. Inadvertently you are equating knowledge of english to higher status in the society. And therefore your friends are saying that "tu style marta hai". If they are your friends who have been used to conversing with you in the native language, they will want to continue doing that even if you are now some big wig in the professional world. That language is a way for them to re-ignite the friendship they had with you in the past. BTW, I am an Indian living in US and love to speak Hindi whenever I can. I even tell my two daughters.. "agar aage jaake mujhse baat karni hai tuo hindi sikhna hai.. mein baat hindi mein hi bast karungaa... baaki tumhaari marzi... " ;)

I think there are many reasons to this and in my opinion it depends on the kind of person you are talking to. But before that I would like to say that in today's world it would be very difficult to survive without English in India. In schools English is the primary medium of instruction right from say 5th standard. So to make your way through India you would need English and some kind of fluency in but. That said, the level of English education is very poor in India. There are engineering graduates, college professors with poor levels of English. Now, coming to the question, the kind of statements come from a particular kind of people. I would divide them broadly into the following categories. 1. People who like to converse in local languages These are the people who know good English, but when they meet some one who speaks either the mother tongue, or Hindi or any other Indian language and they feel more connected when they converse in that. This maybe a wrong perception, however this group includes me too. And these people wont make comments like that because they do not judge a person by their ability to speak English. I prefer to talk in my mother tongue, even though my fluency in it is less than English. And if i meet a person who speaks any other language I know, I switch to that. Lot of people I know prefer to do this. 2. People who think English is destroying the culture These are the people most likely to make such comments. They think that by speaking English, people show their superiority. They maybe also be the people who hate a particular community because they migrated from a different state. ( Like to the people from Bihar or other states in Mumbai.) They think that their own language is superior to everything and thus their attitude to the people speaking English. This may also happen if you speak any language that they do not like. 3. People whose English is poor These people develop a inferiority complex because their English is not so good. And they think that by not knowing English they may not be able to compete at an equal level or contribute to a conversation in a effective manner.  However this is seriously not the case. There is no reason to feel inferior. People of India are very helping by nature and most of them wont ridicule you. Instead they will try and help you improve. I myself have helped people on numerous occasions in editing some essays and so on. Then there is the fourth category who think they are superior because they know English well. They will try to show their superiority by deliberately using words that others wont understand. These are the people in the third category to feel more inferior and they seem to enjoy that. Well it is good that they know English but it is not proper to make others feel inferior because of that. This may also be the reason to the origin of comments like you mentioned. However, this is not the general case. You can't generalise this issue so easily. Now to the improvement in level of English awareness in India. This has to start in our schools. We need teachers who know good English for a start. If we educate the children with good English, they wont face the difficulty we faced. However this maybe difficult. Second is to encourage the habit of reading English books or newspapers. One can learn a lot of English by reading a good newspaper daily and English books. However, recently reading as a hobby is on the decline and things like smartphones are catching up. This needs to be seriously addressed to improve the level of English as well as the knowledge of Indian masses. Update: This article that appeared in The Hindu may give some more insight http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/alphabetical-order-to-discrimination/article4573888.ece

(Originally answered: ) Superior is definitely not a word I would use. More conducive to increasing the odds of success in one's career? Sure. But not superior. To begin with, most Indians do not speak fluent English, while a considerable number finds it unintelligible. The thing is, Indian society was rigidly divided along class (and caste) lines, wherein only the upper classes had access to learning the language during British rule. Furthermore, out of this minority who had access, many didn't avail of the opportunity for lack of incentive. Therefore, by the time the British left, a significant majority of India's population lacked proficiency in the language. Fast-forward 68 years, and you're left with the descendants of those upper class Indians who almost definitely retain their forefathers' skill, as well as those who learnt it over the course of the years in school, at the workplace, etc. But yet again, a majority of the population is bereft of the social mobility this language has to offer. (Note: I'm Bengali, and you're possibly from a different background, and yet here we are conversing with ease. Convenient, isn't it?) Most city schools now use English as a medium of instruction, while rural ones tend to stick to regional languages, Furthermore, the standard of English taught at most schools is not up to the mark.  Read the following article from The Hindu, dated October 27th, 2012 for more on this topic - http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/despite-big-leap-indias-english-proficiency-is-just-moderate-survey/article4036685.ece This leads to yet another kind of class divide among the people; English being the language of international business, knowledge of the language is highly valued in employees - both, in the private and public sectors. One who knows English well is assumed to have been a member of the fortunate class who is likely to succeed in their professional career. An interesting point to note though, is that this success somehow seems to me to be inversely proportional when it comes to politics. That is to say, English proficiency is the least of the credentials required for success in one's political career in India, probably because the skill proves to be of no value when appealing to the masses. Ultimately, Indian society, much like other Asian societies, has evolved to value the knowledge of English over all other languages, and this has lead to the 'superiority', as you put it, of certain individuals over others. Now superiority is not the way I'd put it at all, but it sure helps to learn English if you want to get ahead in life. It opens up a whole new frontier and allows you to exchange thoughts and  ideas with the larger human society, while finding your place in this world as a global citizen.

The reason is not inferiority complex. It is the way in which English is taught in India. In India the concept is 'you must learn grammar before you do anything with English'. In reality, language is an oral art. By Speaking,  and by receiving feedback and responses by listening one fine-tunes the language. Only one attempt in this regard is seen in the efforts of Espoir Technologies, who invented world's first (and only) spoken English simulator. One can attempt any number of conversational situations - and receive contextual feedback and improve their conversation abilities.