South Asian people in Ireland are residents or citizens of Ireland who are of South Asian background or ancestry. There has been an important and well-established community of people of South Asian descent in Ireland since the eighteenth century. Non-Chinese Asian people (the category which mainly includes South Asian people) were reported to be the fastest growing ethnic group in Ireland in the 2011 census.
There is great variation in how much the South Asian people are integrated into Irish society. Many people of South Asian descent are well-integrated and embrace the culture of Ireland. Many children of South Asian descent are born in Ireland or have come to Ireland at a very young age, and therefore learn the Irish language in schools (which is compulsory to children who have been living in the country before the age of 7). There are South Asian people who are up to 2nd and 3rd generation Irish-born. However, many South Asian people still maintain their ancestral customs and languages, and therefore many religious festivals (such as Diwali) are well-known and accepted within Ireland.
As the Irish government does not collect detailed data on ethnicity in Ireland, population estimates vary, and non-Chinese Asian people are generally grouped in one category rather than groups based on people from individual South Asian countries. Estimates say that people of South Asian ethnicity make up around 1 to 3% of Ireland's population. The Irish-India Council estimates that there are approximately 91,520 Indian-born people in Ireland.
Background
Early South Asian presence in Ireland can be traced back to the role played by the East India Company in the eighteenth century. White Irish men working for the East India Company often returned to Ireland with domestic servants and lascars from India, many of whom found themselves in a state of vagrancy, particularly in port towns like Cork. On their return to Ireland, some Irish men working for the East India Company were also accompanied by their Indian wives, mistresses, and mixed race children. This may have been the case for Captain William Massey Baker, a Company officer and the brother of Godfrey Evans Baker who was the patron of Sake Dean Mahomed. Historian Michael H. Fisher speculates that Captain Baker may have been accompanied by his Indian mistress and their teenage Anglo-Indian daughter, Eleanor, on his return to Cork from India. Through the import of Indian domestic servants and lascars, and their relationships with their mistresses, wives, and children, Irish men working for the East India Company played an important role in creating a sizeable South Asian community in Ireland from the eighteenth century onwards.
The late eighteenth century also saw the arrival of Dean Mahomed, an Indian entrepreneur and the most notable Indian resident of Ireland during the eighteenth century. Unlike the domestic servants and lascars imported as cheap labour from India, Mahomed was supported by Godfrey Evans Baker, an East Indian Company officer. Baker sponsored Mahomed's education in Cork where he met his wife Jane Daly, a Protestant woman from an Irish gentry family. Mahomed's connections with Baker allowed him to build his wealth in Cork, and his notable work The Travels of Dean Mahomet was published with the support of Ireland's wealthy elite. After two decades in Cork, Mahomed and his family emigrated to London in 1807.
South Asians continued to visit and settle in Ireland in the nineteenth century. One of the most prominent South Asians to arrive during this time was Mir Aulad Ali (1832–98), a Muslim Indian scholar who worked as Professor of Arabic, Hindustani, and Persian at Trinity College, Dublin. Beyond his academic engagements, Aulad Ali was an example of significant South Asian presence in Dublin's social circles, well-regarded and lauded for his charitable work in the parish of Rathmines. He frequently attended formal events in traditional Indian attire and was often one of the main local dignitaries present to greet and guide foreign parties upon their arrival to Dublin. In this respect, Aulad Ali represented a South Asian community that was not only accepted and welcomed in nineteenth century Ireland, but one that also directly contributed to the enhancement of social and political life. He also represented an increasing presence of mixed race families in Ireland during the nineteenth century, marrying an Englishwoman named Rebecca with whom he had a son, Arthur, who was baptised at the parish of Rathmines.