Sindhi people

Sindhi

سنڌي
Map of Sindhi diaspora
Total population
c. 37 million (census)
Regions with significant populations
Pakistan Sindh Balochistan	34,252,262
India	3,810,000
Saudi Arabia	180,980
United Arab Emirates	94,620
United Kingdom	51,015
United States	38,760
Philippines	33,000
Hong Kong	20,000
Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (Sindhis in Afghanistan)	15,000
Bangladesh	15,000
Canada	12,065
Singapore	11,860
Indonesia	10,000
Kenya	3,300
South Africa	3,168
Australia	2,635
Bahrain	1,508
Sri Lanka	1,000
Saint Martin	1,000
Kuwait	825
Oman	700
Tanzania	616
Malaysia	600
Gibraltar	500
Mozambique	266
Mauritius	200
Madagascar	116
Belize	100
Turkey	91
Fiji	86
Yemen	66
Qatar	41
Malawi	21
Languages
Sindhi English, Hindi–Urdu (Sanskrit/Arabic as liturgical languages) and numerous other languages widely spoken within the Sindhi diaspora
Religion
Majority: Islam: 80 % Minority: Hinduism (incl. Nanakpanthis): 20 %, Sikhism, Buddhism, Christianity
Related ethnic groups
Other Indo-Aryan peoples

Sindhis (Sindhi: سنڌي; Sindhī) are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group of people originating from the Sindh province of Pakistan. Today Sindhis mostly practice Islam, but historically they practised Buddhism and Hinduism also a large minority of them still do today. The original inhabitants of ancient Sindh were believed to be aboriginal tribes speaking languages of the Indus Valley civilization around 3000 BC. This population then mixed with the Aryans that arrived later on which created the modern Sindhi ethnic group.

In the book Kitab-ul-Hind, the Persian scholar Abū Rayhān Bīrūnī (Al-Beruni) declared that even before the advent of Islam into Sindh (711 A.D.), the Sindhi language was prevalent in Sindh.

Religion

Sindh was the first place in the Indian subcontinent to be conquered by a Muslim state and the first to have a significant Muslim population. Islam arrived in Sindh after the Umayyad conquest and annexation of Sindh in the year 711 AD led by the Arab general Muhammad ibn Qasim. Sindh became the easternmost province of the Caliphate. The second significant religion of the Sindhis is Hinduism which is the historical religion of Sindhi people as it was practised before the Muslim conquest. Today, Sindhi Hindus make up about 20% of the total ethnic Sindhi population worldwide. Sindhi Hindus also revere the Sikh gurus and especially the first Sikh guru, Guru Nanak.

Every year for 30 years during the early 20th century, Sikh missionary groups were sent to work among Sindhis. Because of this, the number of Sindhi Sikhs increased from 1000 in 1901 to over 39,000 in 1941. During the Partition of former British India in 1947, many Sindhi Hindus and Sindhi Sikhs left for India. They settled in Mumbai, New Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat. Later, a small number of them decided to settle in the Punjab State of India. Their main centers of pilgrimage are Sadhu Bela, an Udasi sect shrine built in 1823 in Sukkur District. They also visit the Sikh shrines of Nankana Sahib, Panja Sahib, and Dehra Sahib in Punjab Province of Pakistan. Today, there is still a large Sindhi Hindu minority in the Sindh province of Pakistan. However, the majority of Sindhi Hindus live in India as their forefathers migrated there during partition.