Indians in Thailand

Thai Indians are Thai people with full or partial Indian ancestry. [1] But these ancestral ties are usually left out of statistics. About 65,000 Indian Thais have full Thai citizenship, but around 400,000 persons of Indian origin settled in Thailand mainly in the urban cities.

Thai Indians
Indian diaspora dressed in sari dancing at Dipavali Bangkok 2022
Total population
Indian nationals
65,000
People of Indian descent
465,000
Regions with significant populations
Bangkok · Pattaya · Chiang Mai · Phuket
Languages
Thai · Tamil · English · Gujarati · Urdu · Punjabi
Religion
Hinduism · Christianity · Buddhism · Sikhism · Islam
Related ethnic groups
People of Indian Origin

Migration history

Since ancient time, there have been various exchanges between the Indians and Thailand. Modern Indian communities have been around since the 1860s of the British Raj era. Most of the Indians arrived in the last century, notably from Tamil Nadu and other areas of Southern India. Some others came from Northern India such as Delhi, Punjab, Rajasthan and some from Gujarat. Buddhism and Hinduism originally arrived in Thailand from India and spread over the centuries.

Some Thai Muslims, especially in the Southern part of Thailand, have Indian ancestry.

The historical number of the Indian population in Thailand can be seen in British consular statistics; however, these figures often lumped Indians together with Sinhalese and Malays. According to 1912 statistics, there were 30 Indians registered in the Chiengmai (Chiang Mai) consular district, 41 Indians and Malays in the Puket (Phuket) consular district, 40 Indians and Malays in the Senggora (Songkhla) consular district, and 423 Indians, Sinhalese, and Malays in the Bangkok consular district. These figures were also believed to be a gross undercount of the true population; for example, the Bangkok consular district had registered only 517 British subjects, but other estimates claimed the number was 20 times higher.[2]

Notable people

See also

References
  1. Kutanan, Wibhu; Kampuansai, Jatupol; Brunelli, Andrea; Ghirotto, Silvia; Pittayaporn, Pittayawat; Ruangchai, Sukhum; Schröder, Roland; Macholdt, Enrico; Srikummool, Metawee; Kangwanpong, Daoroong; Hübner, Alexander (June 2018). "New insights from Thailand into the maternal genetic history of Mainland Southeast Asia". European Journal of Human Genetics. 26 (6): 898–911. doi:10.1038/s41431-018-0113-7. ISSN 1476-5438. PMC 5974021. PMID 29483671.
  2. Bangkok and Siam, directory, Straits Settlements and Siam: Bangkok Times Press, 1914, p. 199


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