Malaysian Indians

Malaysian Indians
Orang India Malaysia
Total population
2,019,600[1]
6.6% of the Malaysian population (2020)[1]
Regions with significant populations
West coast of Peninsular Malaysia (mostly in Selangor, Negeri Sembilan, Perak, Penang, Kuala Lumpur, Kedah and Johor)
Singapore (20,483 in 2010)[2]
Languages
Malaysian Tamil/Tamil (majority) • English • Malay • Manglish (creole) • Melayu Chetty • Other Indian languages such as Punjabi, Telugu, Malayalam and others
Religion
Predominantly
Hinduism
Minorities
Christianity · Islam · Buddhism · Sikhism · Jainism · Zoroastrianism · Baháʼí
Related ethnic groups
Indian Singaporeans, Burmese Indians, Indian Indonesians, Malaysian Malayali, Chitty, Chindians, Indo-Caribbeans, Indians in South Africa, Indo-Fijians, Indo-Mauritians

Malaysian Indians or Indo-Malaysians are Malaysian citizens of Indian or South Asian ancestry. Most are descendants of those who migrated from India to British Malaya from the mid-19th to the mid-20th centuries.[3][4] Most Malaysian Indians are ethnic Tamils; smaller groups include the Malayalees, Telugus and Punjabis. Malaysian Indians form the fifth-largest community of Overseas Indians in the world.[5] In Malaysia, they represent the third-largest group, constituting 7% of the Malaysian population, after the Bumiputera (combined grouping of ethnic Malays and other indigenous groups) and the Chinese.[1] They are usually referred to simply as "Indians" in English, Orang India in Malay, "Yin du ren" in Chinese.

Malaysia's Indian population is notable for its class stratification, with a significant elite and a large low income group within its fold.[6][7] Malaysian Indians large percentage of professionals per capita by constituting 15.5% of Malaysia's professionals in 1999 has been reduced with substantial population close to 40% is now considered the B40 category.[8][6] In the 1984 census, up to 38% of the nation's medical professional workforce consisted of Malaysian Indians, but this has been since been reduced.[8][9] In 1970, the per-capita income of Malaysian Indians was 76% higher than that of the Malay majority.[10] Despite attempts by the Malaysian government to redistribute wealth since the 1970s through institutionalized racial policy,[11][12] by 2005 Malaysian Indians still earned a 27% higher per capita income than that of the dominant Malay community.[10]

  1. ^ a b c Department of Statistics Malaysia (2020). "Current population and estimates, Malaysia 2020 Group". Retrieved 15 July 2020.
  2. ^ "Census of Population 2010" (PDF). Singapore Department of Statistics. Archived from the original (PDF) on 16 October 2016. Retrieved 4 February 2018.
  3. ^ Viswanathan Selvaratnam (1 May 2021). "From Servitude to Underclass: The Empire's South Indian 'Coolies' in Postcolonial Malaysia". Economic and Political Weekly. 56 (18). The ancestral root of about 80% of Malaysian Indians is in the British Empire's Madras Presidency (now Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala).
  4. ^ Watson Andaya, Barbara; Andaya, Leonard Y. (2001). A History of Malaysia. University of Hawaii Press. pp. 4, 181–185. ISBN 9780824824259.
  5. ^ "Indian Diaspora" (PDF). Ministry of External Affairs. 24 November 2023. Retrieved 24 November 2023.
  6. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference malaymail2015 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ "Visiting Indian Diaspora in Malaysia | Diplomacy & Beyond Plus".
  8. ^ a b M. Shamsul Haque (November 2003). "The Role of the State in Managing Ethnic Tensions in Malaysia" (PDF). American Behavioral Scientist. 47 (3): 240–266. doi:10.1177/0002764203256186. S2CID 53021386.
  9. ^ Cite error: The named reference :0 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  10. ^ a b Saari, M Yusof; Dietzenbacher, Erik; Los, Bart (2015). "Sources of Income Growth and Inequality Across Ethnic Groups in Malaysia, 1970–2000" (PDF). World Development. 76: 311–328. doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2015.07.015. Retrieved 29 January 2018.
  11. ^ Cite error: The named reference :1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  12. ^ Cite error: The named reference :4 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).