Q:

Would it makes sense for an intelligent race originated from snakes to possess the ability of hearing?

I want to explore the possibilities of an alien species not much unlike that of known to Earth: snakes going through evolution in a way that made them able to reach the intelligence necessary to use tools and form civilizations.
With arms and legs, of course, which implies that this species may have similarities with lizards and other reptiloid races, as well.
This assumption implies a lot of serious changes, e.g. in diet (exclusively omnivore snakes vs exclusively herbivore lizards), but right now, I have a specific question about perception.
I'm not a biologist, so I may be wrong, but I heard a theory that snakes are deaf, or at least they can't hear the way we do. It isn't an option for my species, though: I need them to be able to speak, and that is pointless without hearing.
Is it feasible to assume that during evolution, my snake-like species gained not only proper limbs, but also the ability to hear (and speak)? Would it mean any additional specific biological changes? (e.g. there would be no need to use their tongue the way "original" snakes do)

A:

On Earth, snakes evolved from lizards mostly via simplifications. The most famous of those is the loss of legs. But the ears were also affected: when lizards actually hear sound in the range 500-4000 Hz (some up to 10000 Hz), snakes typically only respond to vibrations that they feel through they bellies in the 50-1000 Hz range (see here).
There's Dollo's law: evolutionary losses are unlikely to reemerge. So I see 3 options for your snakes:

They are not like Earth snakes at all.
They can only "speak" through physical contact.
At some point of their evolution, their ancestors got into a very tough situation, where actual hearing was crucial to the survival. Most those ancient snakes died. The few remaining have redeveloped the ears back.

A:

Yes it certainly makes sense. Here is why: Claims that a particular animal is deaf or color blind, or lacking in any similar way, should always be taken as dubious. Very often the real finding is that an animal hears or perceives colors differently than a human. For example dogs are not color blind, they are dichromatic.
Snakes seem to posses something like hearing, in that they can detect vibrations (whether this is purely tactile or whether it uses a part of the brain that we would recognize as the auditory context I don't know. But since you are not talking about literal snakes on Earth you can choose). So in the evolutionary process whereby your primitive snake like beings evolve into human like snake beings you could do something like this: 
The snakes were already utilizing "sound" in the form of detecting vibrations through the ground. As they evolved towards bipedalism (assuming that is what you want) the ability to detect vibrations in the ground would lessen (as less of the body is in contact with the ground). This could provide the evolutionary pressure whereby the snake beings with a slight genetic variation allowing vibrations to be detected further from the ground would be more successful. There is still a large gap between this and the development of hearing necessary for auditory communication, but it provides a rational start.
There will always be some chance involved in a process like this, because there is no reason to believe that a trait will come to be just because it would be beneficial. I mention this because many people mistakenly think that a trait will evolve because it is useful, or that the need for a trait magically causes it to arise over time. I just wanted to point out that there is no evidence for that type of evolution.
In regard to additional changes: Human like speech and comprehension are computationally complicated and expensive. I would expect larger brains, larger skulls, and possibly the need to be born premature to prevent the large skull from complicating birth.
You could also postulate that they would have more gracile features (like smaller teeth) if you like the idea that social beings can benefit from the retention of juvenile characteristics.

