Together with English, Hindi is the official language of India. About 182 million people speak Hindi as their native language and many others speak Hindi as a second language-some estimates say that around 350 million people speak Hindi.
Syntax
Hindi uses a different word order than English. The main differences are that verbs are placed at the end of the sentence (like in German) and that Hindi (like other Indian languages) uses postpositions instead of prepositions. Postpositions are like prepositions except that they are written after the noun. Example:
Normal sentences
English: Subject Verb Object => I learn Hindi
Hindi: Subject Object Verb => I Hindi learn
Imperative sentences
English: Verb Place Adverb => Come here now
Hindi: Place Adverb Verb => Here now come
Questions
English: Adverb Aux.Verb Subject Verb => What are you drawing?
Hindi: Subject Adverb Verb => You what draw?
Verbs
Hindi verbs are inflected with respect to gender of the subject (masculine, feminine), number of the subject (singular, plural), tense (present, past, future), action (perfect, imperfect, continuous), degree of respect (intimate, familiar, respect). Verbs are referred to in their infinitive noun form which ends in na.
Examples:
bolna to speak
likhna to write
lena to take
ana to come
The stem of a verb is the infinitive form minus the na ending.
Examples:
bol
likh
le
a
Nouns
Gender
Hindi has two genders, masculine (nouns ending in i) and feminine (nouns ending in a) but there are exceptions. As for the number, we distinguish between singular and plural.
Case
There are two cases in Hindi, direct and indirect. The indirect case is used when the noun is followed by a post-position, otherwise the direct case is used. Examples:
Masculine nouns on -a: larka = boy
Singular larka (direct) larke (indirect)
Plural larke(direct) larkon (indirect)
Feminine nouns on -i: larki = girl
Singular larki (direct) larki (indirect)
Plural larkiyan (direct) larkiyon (indirect)