Pashtun diaspora

Not to be confused with Afghan diaspora.

Pashtun diaspora
Regions with significant populations
 United Arab Emirates578,315 (2021)[1]
 United States138,554 (2021) (Estimate)[2]
 India260,577 (2018)[3]
 United Kingdom200,000 (2015)[4]
 Germany150,800 (2021)[5]
 Iran169,000 (2022)[6]
 Australia81,154 (2021)[7]
 Canada60,590 (2018)[8][verification needed]
 Russia19,800 (2015)[9]
 Malaysia5,500 (2008)[6]
 Thailand500,000(estimate)
 Turkey152,000(2021)
Languages
Pashto, Dari Persian, Hindko, Urdu-Hindi, English
Religion
Majority:
Sunni Islam
Minority:
Shia Islam, Hinduism,[10] Sikhism[11]

Pashtun diaspora (Pashto: بهر میشت پښتانه) comprises all ethnic Pashtuns. There are millions of Pashtuns who are living outside of their traditional homeland of Pashtunistan, a historic region that is today situated over parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan.[12] While the (erstwhile) Pashtunistan is home to the majority of Pashtun people, there are significant local Pashtun diaspora communities scattered across the neighbouring Pakistani provinces of Sindh and Punjab, particularly in their respective provincial capital cities of Karachi and Lahore. Additionally, people with Pashtun ancestry are also found across India; particularly in Rohilkhand, a region in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh; and in the Indian states of Gujarat and Rajasthan. Outside of South Asia, significant Pashtun diaspora communities are found in the Arab states of the Persian Gulf (primarily in the United Arab Emirates), the United States, the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Iran, Australia, Canada, and Russia.

The Pashtun people, who are classified as an Iranian ethnolinguistic group, are believed to have settled in the traditional Pashtunistan region around the early 1st millennium CE.[13][14] According to Ethnologue, the total Pashtun population currently stands at around 30 million,[15] but some sources give slightly lower or higher figures. Among Indic communities in the Indian subcontinent, Pashtuns are commonly referred to by the word Pathan.

  1. ^ "United Arab Emirates: Demography" (PDF). Encyclopædia Britannica World Data. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 15 March 2008.
  2. ^ 42% of 200,000 Afghan-Americans = 84,000 and 15% of 363,699 Pakistani-Americans = 54,554. Total Afghan and Pakistani Pashtuns in USA = 138,554.
  3. ^ Ali, Arshad (15 February 2018). "Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan's great granddaughter seeks citizenship for 'Phastoons' in India". Daily News and Analysis. Retrieved 21 February 2019. Interacting with mediapersons on Wednesday, Yasmin, the president of All India Pakhtoon Jirga-e-Hind, said that there were 32 lakh Phastoons in the country who were living and working in India's Delhi but were yet to get citizenship.
  4. ^ Maclean, William (10 June 2009). "Support for Taliban dives among British Pashtuns". Reuters. Retrieved 6 August 2009.
  5. ^ Relations between Afghanistan and Germany Archived 16 January 2017 at the Wayback Machine: Germany is now home to almost 90,000 people of Afghan origin. 42% of 90,000 = 37,800
  6. ^ a b "Ethnologue report for Southern Pashto: Iran (2022)". Ethnologue: Languages of the World. Retrieved 5 October 2023.
  7. ^ "20680-Ancestry (full classification list) by Sex – Australia" (Microsoft Excel download). 2006 Census. Australian Bureau of Statistics. Retrieved 2 June 2008. Total responses: 25,451,383 for total count of persons: 19,855,288.
  8. ^ "Census Profile, 2016 Census - Canada [Country] and Canada [Country]". 8 February 2017.
  9. ^ "Perepis.ru". perepis2002.ru (in Russian).
  10. ^ "70 years on, one Pashtun town still safeguards its old Hindu-Muslim brotherhood". Arab News. Retrieved 15 February 2024.
  11. ^ "the-sikhs-of-peshawar-explained-7923180". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 15 February 2024.
  12. ^ "Pashtun". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 10 September 2010.
  13. ^ "Afghan and Afghanistan". Abdul Hai Habibi. alamahabibi.com. 1969. Retrieved 24 October 2010.
  14. ^ Muhammad Qasim Hindu Shah (Firishta). "History of the Mohamedan Power in India". Persian Literature in Translation. Packard Humanities Institute. Archived from the original on 11 February 2009. Retrieved 10 January 2007.
  15. ^ "Pashto, Northern". SIL International. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. June 2010. Retrieved 18 September 2010. Ethnic population: 29,529,000 possibly total Pashto in all countries.