You listen to Chennai-waasis (especially the youth of Chennai) speak English and you will invariably find at least one of the following three, if not all, in what is spoken:
- Sentence starts with the word “Man”
- Sentence ends with the word “no” or “right” (In fact “right” is common to people from other parts of the country too)
- Use of “I can’t able to”
Now that I am a Chennai-waasi myself, the words “Man” and “no” have started finding their place regularly in what I speak.
Here is what happened yesterday in the coffee shop at my office. One of my colleagues went and gave the following order: “1 Tea. No sugar. 1 Coffee”. Here is what the guy at the counter understood: “1 Tea No . Sugar. 1 Coffee”. It wouldn’t be a surprise to know that my colleague got tea with sugar in it while what he wanted was tea without sugar. The word “no” was just redundant.
Lesson learnt: If one wants to use the word “no”, he/she must treat it like an “escape character”. An ideal way to place the order would probably have been the following: “Man. 1 Tea no. No Sugar no. 1 Coffee no. You got it right no“.
Ramkumar R 
This ‘I can/can’t be able to do’ is the worst!
Hello,
Yes,I have heard ‘can be able to’ being used very often even by people in positions of repute.
Sathej
No no. this is wrong right.
HA ha ha..See now this is the blogger I know.
EU,
Nice to see you on wordpress these days !!