Should english be the medium of instruction in our education system?

The world is today becoming smaller. We have Indians working all over the world. There are so many multinational companies setting up firms in India and many of our Indian companies are becoming multinational companies. In short, each person is part of a global workforce. In order for a person to survive and thrive in this environment, he will need to communicate and interact with people from every corner of the world.

Unofficially English has become the international language. Given this scenario, how many of us are well versed in English? What should be done to improve the percentage of English speaking Indians?

My opinion is, make English the medium of instruction in school or make English a mandatory subject in school. I prefer the former. My education was with English as the medium of instruction and it helped me when I moved to the U.S. In the international arena good English speaking Indians are preferred over the Chinese. Why? Chinese have their education with Chinese as their medium of instruction and when they move to the international arena, they are not fluent in English even though they have learnt English are one of their subjects in school.

Let me know what you think?