Malaysian Indians or Indian Malaysians are Malaysian citizens of Indian or South Asian ancestry. They now form the third-largest group in Malaysia, after the Malays and the Chinese. Most are descendants of those who migrated from India to British Malaya from the early 19th to the mid-20th centuries.
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. In Malaysia, they represent the third-largest group (constituting 6.8% of the Malaysian population), after the ethnic Malays and the Chinese. They are usually referred to simply as "Indians" in Malaysia, 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. Malaysian Indians make up a disproportionately large percentage of professionals per capita by constituting 15.5% of Malaysia's professionals in 1999. In the 1984 census, up to 38% of the nation's medical professional workforce consisted of Malaysian Indians. In 1970, the per-capita income of Malaysian Indians was 76% higher than that of the Malay majority. By 2005, that gap had reduced to 27%.
History
First Wave: Pre-colonial period
Ancient India exerted a profound influence over Southeast Asia through trade, religious missions, wars and other forms of contact. Pre-colonial Malaysia was part of 'Indianised Kingdoms' such as Srivijaya, Kadaram and the Majapahit, which formed part of a cultural region known as Greater India. There is a possibility that the first wave of migration from India towards Southeast Asia happened during Asoka's invasion towards Kalinga and Samudragupta's expedition towards the South.
The Arab and Indian traders had travelled this region including the southern tip of South East Asia the peninsula with maritime trade, the Sailendra kings of Java were able to take control of the Peninsular and part of southern Siam. The kings welcomed Buddhist missionaries from India, accepting their teaching of the Mahayana sect, which spread through their territories. However, central and northeastern Thailand continued to adhere to the Hinayana teachings of the Theravada sect, which had been introduced by missionaries sent by the emperor Ashoka in the 3rd century BC. Another theory of the introduction of Buddhism after Indian arrived in the peninsula is that after Kalinga conquered lower Burma in the 8th century their influence gradually spread down the peninsula. The ancient Indian Kalinga was located in southeastern India occupying modern day Orissa and northern Andhra Pradesh. In the 7th century an Indonesian kingdom was named Kalingga after the aforementioned Kalinga in India. Chinese sources mention this kingdom (Holing) as a center for Buddhist scholars around 604 before it was overshadowed by the Sanjaya or Mataram Kingdom. The most famous Kalingga ruler is Ratu Sima.
There is evidence of the existence of Indianised kingdoms such as Gangga Negara, Old Kedah, Srivijaya since approximately 1700 years ago. Early contact between the kingdoms of Tamilakkam and the Malay peninsula had been very close during the reigns of the Pallava dynasty (from the 4th to the 9th century CE) and Chola dynasty (from the 9th to the 13th century CE). The trade relations the Tamil merchants had with the ports of Malaya led to the emergence of Indianised kingdoms like Kadaram (Old Kedah) and Langkasugam. Furthermore, Chola king Rajendra Chola I sent an expedition to Kadaram (Srivijaya) during the 11th century conquering that country on behalf of one of its rulers who sought his protection and to have established him on the throne. The Cholas had a powerful merchant and naval fleet in the Indian Ocean and the Bay of Bengal. Three kinds of craft are distinguished by the author of the Periplus – light coasting boats for local traffic, larger vessels of a more complicated structure and greater carrying capacity, and lastly the big ocean-going vessels that made the voyages to Malaya, Sumatra, and the Ganges. In Malacca Sultanate, the Chitty people, played a huge role in Malacca's administration of the local ports such as Raja Mudaliar, Syahbandar (Chief of Port) of Malacca and Bendahara Tun Mutahir, a famous Bendahara of the Malaccan Sultanate.