Non-resident Indian and Person of Indian Origin
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- "NRI" redirects here. For other meanings, see NRI (disambiguation)
A non-resident Indian (NRI) is an Indian citizen who has migrated to another country. Other terms with the same meaning are overseas Indian and expatriate Indian. For tax and other official purpose the government of India considers any Indian national away from India for more than 180 days in a year an NRI. In common usage, this often includes Indian born individuals who have taken the citizenship of other countries.
A Person of Indian Origin (PIO) is literally, simply a person of Indian origin who is not a citizen of India. For the purposes of issuing a PIO Card, the Indian government considers anyone of Indian origins up to four generations removed, to be a PIO [1] (http://www.indianembassy.org/policy/PIO/Introduction_PIO.html).
There is a huge NRI and PIO population across the world, estimated at around 25 million.
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Moving on out
The most significant historical emigration from India was to South East Asia. It started as a military expedition by Hindu, and later Buddhist, kings of South India and resulted in the settlers' merging with the local society. The influence of Indian culture is still strongly felt in South East Asia, especially in places like Bali (in Indonesia). However, in such cases, it is not reasonable to apply the label 'PIO' to the descendents of emigrants from several centuries back, especially since intermixture is so great as to negate the value of such nomenclature in this context.
During the nineteenth century and until the end of the Raj, much of the migration that happened was of a forced nature - export of (thinly disguised) slave labor to other colonies under the indenture system. The major destinations, in chronological order, were Mauritius, British Guyana, the West Indies (Trinidad and Jamaica), Fiji and East Africa. There was also a small amount of free emigration of skilled laborers and professionals to some of these countries in the twentieth century.
An unrelated system involved recruitment of workers for the tea plantations of the neighboring British colonies of Sri Lanka and Burma and the rubber plantations of British Malaya (now Malaysia and Singapore).
During the Partition of India, there was a lot of migration between India and Pakistan, primarily of Muslims relocating to West Pakistan and Hindus and Sikhs relocating to India. A similar migration took place on the East side of India in the Bengal region between East Pakistan (since 1971 the nation of Bangladesh) and the Indian state of West Bengal. In total, about 7 million Muslims shifted to Pakistan, 10 million Hindus and Sikhs went to India, and anywhere from 500,000 to 1 million people died in riots and religious strife. Government policy, especially in lieu of India's reaching out to expatriates for investment (and extending, in some cases, offers of dual-citizenship), has refused to recognize Pakistanis and Bangladeshis as, officially, Persons of Indian Origin. This interesting situation is not, of course, a denial of recent history, but a result of the divisive nationalism that exists between India and Pakistan and, to a lesser extent, Bangladesh.
After independence in 1947, the pattern of emigration naturally changed. At first Indians sought better fortune mainly in the United Kingdom, but later North America, especially the USA (with 1.7 million Indians in total), became the favored destination after change in Indian emigration law that made this possible. Some displaced PIOs in Africa (especially under Idi Amin in Uganda) and the Caribbean also reached the UK. Smaller numbers of Indians have also emigrated to the English-speaking countries like Australia.
After the 1970s oil boom in the Middle East, a large number of Indians emigrated to the Gulf countries. However, this was on a contractual basis rather than permanent as in the other cases.
PIOs today
Indian Americans
Indians in the USA are one of the largest among the groups of Indian diaspora, numbering about 1.7 million, and probably the most well off - their median income is 1.5 times that of the host country. They are well represented in all walks of life, but particularly so in academia, information technology and medicine. There were over 4000 PIO professors and 33,000 Indian-born students in American universities in 1997-98. The American Association of the Physicians of Indian Origin boasts a membership of 35,000. In 2000, Fortune magazine estimated the wealth generated by Indian Silicon Valley entrepreneurs at around $250 billion.
There appear to be class differences within the Indian American community, with earlier professional immigrants looking down upon working-class communities who are later first generation immigrants. Gujarati shopkeepers and Punjabi cab drivers are common stereotypes of the latter community. Another large community is that of Telugus. Most older generation Telugus are mostly doctors or folks who came to do their masters and settled down. The majority of recent Telugus are IT professionals who came to US late 90s onwards during the IT boom.
These IT professionals (whether Telugus or non-Telugus) form yet another social class of their own somewhere between the professional immigrants or immigrants who came to do their schooling in United States, and working-class communities. These IT professionals are also referred to as 'H-1' or 'H-1 types'.
Americans of Indian descent have, in the past, been targets of racism by members of all ethnic groups--though it has dissipated substantially. Some of it is overt, perhaps the worst example being the New Jersey dot busters - groups of thugs who sought ethnic Indians and mugged them or attacked their property in the late 80s and early 90s, the "dot" referring to the bindi worn traditionally by Hindu women on their forehead. Perhaps the tendency of some Indian Americans to retain a strong cultural identity and socialize within their own community and reluctance to integrate into mainstream society contributed to the problem. This lack of assimilation has created many problems for both ethnic Indians as well as non Indians.
Another peculiarity are most children of these immigrants - also called as "ABCD" - American Born Confused Desi. This term (usually used as something of an insult) reflects the fact that these first generation Americans find themselves stuck between traditional parents and upbringing at home and the more liberal and open community outside. This "in-between-ness" can leave them with uncertainty about their own role in society - neither Indian nor American.
Indians in the UK
The Indian emigrant community in the United Kingdom is now in its third generation. As an immigrant group, people of Indian origin have been remarkably successful.
A remarkable collection of the oral history of the British NRIs is available on Britain's leading NRI website History Talking.com (http://www.historytalking.com). It's a web radio where you can listen to some of the leading NRIs living in the UK.
Stereotypes about Indians have now moved from their being bus-conductors, waiters, and small shopkeepers to their being doctors, lawyers, accountants and successful businesspeople. Increasingly, the second and third generation of Indians has started inter-marrying with the rest of the population, to the point where this has in itself become a stereotype.
In a few local areas, ethnic tension has resulted in ill-feeling and racist violence against immigrants, and groups such as the British National Party have exploited this. However, in general, racism towards people of Indian origin has greatly reduced from the early days of mass immigration after Partition and the expulsion of the Ugandan Asians.
Islam is one of the fastest-growing religions in the UK, to a large extent because of immigrants from the subcontinent. Indian culture has been constantly referenced within wider British culture, at first as an "exotic" influence in films like My Beautiful Laundrette, but now increasingly as a familiar feature in films like Bend It Like Beckham. Indian food is now regarded as part of the British cuisine.
According to the April 2001 UK National Census [2] (http://www.statistics.gov.uk/statbase/ssdataset.asp?vlnk=6892&More=Y), 4.37% of the population of England and Wales identified themselves as "Asian" or "Asian British", and 0.36% as "Mixed: White and Asian", making a total of 4.73% of the population, or 2.46 million people, identifying themselves as of "Asian" descent. (Note: in the UK context, "Asian" means Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi).
Indians in Malaysia
Indians migrated to Malaysia as plantation laborers under British rule. They are a significant minority ethnic group, making up 10% of the Malaysian population. Most of these are Tamil but some Malayalam and Telugu speaking people are also present. They have retained their languages and religion -- 80% of ethnic Indians in Malaysia identify as Hindus. Hinduism in Malaysia diverges from mainstream (post-Vedantic) Hinduism: its main feature is Mother-goddess (Amman) worship; caste deities, tantric rituals, folk beliefs, non-Agamic temples, and animal sacrifice are its other characteristics. Deepavali and Thaipusam are the main festivals.However, there is an increase in agamic worship in Malaysia, due to the efforts of Malaysian Hindu Sangam and several notable Hindu leaders such as Subhramanya Swami of Hinduism Today.
Indians in the Middle East
There is a huge population of Indians in the Middle East, especially in the oil rich monarchies neighboring the Persian Gulf. Most moved to the Gulf after the oil boom to work as labourers and for clerical jobs. However, a significant minority are either employed in the highest echelons of major banks and corporations or have prospered greatly through conducting business in the region. Indians in the Gulf do not become citizens however. They retain their Indian passports since the countries in the Gulf do not provide citizenship or permanent residency. One of the major reasons Indians still like to work in the Gulf is because of the tax-free income it provides and its proximity to India.
Bollystan: The Global India
As the Indian government's own Singhvi commission notes, "the sun never sets on the Indian diaspora." Yet the cultural transmission model is rapidly transforming from a one-way street, in which the Motherland gives and the diaspora receives, to a two-way street, in which the diaspora is as confidently Indian, sometimes more so, than India itself. Bollystan ("Bolly-" for Bollywood, and "Stan", the Persian suffix for "land" comprise this term) is a neologism which recognizes this changing balance of power between the home country and its diaspora. Technology has enabled the diaspora to manufacture "Indian-ness" as competently as their home-bound relatives through film, dance, music and even religious practices. These externally produced symbols of Indian-ness have in many ways become the primary representation of India in the West and around the world. The term was first used by Parag Khanna, when he guest edited the UK's ethnic lifestyle magazine Another Generation in Fall 2004 (www.anothergeneration-mag.com). The entire issue was based on the theme of Bollystan, This was subsequently then used in an article in The Globalist [3] (http://www.theglobalist.com/DBWeb/storyid.aspx?StoryId=4279). The London-based Foreign Policy Centre think-tank has also recognized Bollystan as a form of "diasporic diplomacy" [4] (http://fpc.org.uk/fsblob/377.pdf). In the January/February 2005 issue of Foreign Policy magazine, Mitra Kalita of the Washington Post writes, "Finally there is a name for where I live: Bollystan." [5] (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/users/login.php?story_id=2761&URL=http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=2761)
Issues
Following are some consider issues for India when Indians migrate to other countries
- "Brain drain" (The exodus of educated workers and academics).
- Foreign exchange inflow (Though the government gets inflow of money, it is not liable)
- Cultural exchange (Indian culture is under threat, when NRIs return home they bring other culture)
- Identity crisis (Identity is lost, Indians fails to recognize when they return; in foreign they are still considered as Indians)
- "X = X + 1 Syndrome" (Syndrome of postponing returning to India every year)
- "NRI Syndrome" (Talking ill of India and Indians, once having exposure to other countries)
Indian emigration law
Indian emigration law provides easy mechanism for emigrants.
Reference
- Tai Pucam in Malaysia (http://murugan.org/research/belle.htm)