Sindhi Hindus are Sindhis who follow Hinduism and whose origins lie in the Pakistani province of Sindh. They are the largest religious minority in Sindh. After the partition of British India in 1947, many Sindhi Hindus were among those who fled from Pakistan to the dominion of India, in what was a wholesale exchange of Hindu and Muslim populations in some areas. Some later emigrated from South Asia and settled in other parts of the world.
According to the 2017 census, there are 4.18 million Sindhi Hindus residing within the Sindh province of Pakistan with major population centers being Mirpur Khas Division and Hyderabad Division that combined account for more than 2 million of them. Meanwhile, the 2011 census listed 2.77 million speakers of Sindhi in India, including speakers of Kutchi, a number that does not include Sindhi Hindus who no longer speak the Sindhi language. The vast majority of Sindhi Hindus living in India belong to the Lohana jāti, which includes the sub-groups of Amil and Bhaiband.
Hinduism in Sindh
Prior to Arab invasions, majority of Sindh's population practiced Hinduism, although a significant minority adhered to Buddhism as well. During the Arab invasions, majority of Sindhi Hindus were a rural pastoral population, who lived mostly in upper Sindh, a region that was entirely Hindu; while the Buddhists of Sindh were a mercantile population, who lived entirely in the urban areas of lower Sindh.
After many successful raids, collaboration by the local Buddhist population, and resistance by the local Hindu population, the army of the Umayyad Caliphate led by Muhammad Bin Qasim successfully invaded and conquered Sindh in 712CE, against the last Hindu king of Sindh, Raja Dahir.
Sindh, under the control of Qasim, saw a decline of Buddhism, as most Buddhists started converting to Islam. The later reign of the Delhi Sultanate, led to further decline, with both Hinduism and Buddhism becoming minority religions in Sindh. Buddhism later collapsed and ceased to exist in Sindh, while Hinduism remained persistent, managing to survive and flourish throughout the centuries as a minority religion. The consistency of Hinduism in Sindh is credited the dependency of the rural Hindu population on Brahmins.
Prior to the partition of India, as per the 1941 census, the Sindhi Hindu population accounted for around 27% of Sindh's population, most of whom moved to India. Today, Sindhi Hindus in Pakistan number around 4.2 million, around 9% of the region's population. Sindhi Hindus are the largest ethnolinguistic Hindu group in Pakistan.
Sindhi Hindus in India
During the first half of 1948, approximately 1 million Sindhi Hindus immigrated to India. Various refugee colonies have been set up by Government of India for accommodation of Sindhi refugees across the nation like: Ahmedabad, Gandhidham, kandla and Adipur camps in Gujarat, Sindhi Camp bus stand in Rajasthan's capital Jaipur, Cox Town camp in Karnataka's capital Bangalore and Ulhasnagar (Kalyan Camp) in Maharashtra.
According to the 2011 Census of India, there are around 2.8 million Sindhi-language speakers living in India, however, this number does not include ethnic Sindhis who no longer speak Sindhi. Sindhis formed a major-chunk of population of Ulhasnagar Municipality (Mumbai Metropolitan Region), Maharashtra. The population of Ulhasnagar city is 500k, out of which 400k of the residents are Sindhis, thus constituting 80% of the city's population as per 2011 census report. Ulhasnagar is also known as India's "Mini Sindh" due to having the highest concentration of Sindhis in one city in India.
Partition of India
After the partition of India in 1947, the majority of Sindh's Hindus migrated to India, mainly forced by the religious-based persecution sponsored by Muhajir refugees at the time. They settled primarily in the neighbouring Kutch district of Gujarat, which bears linguistic and cultural similarities to Sindh, and the city of Bombay. As per Census of India 2011, there are around 1,741,662 Sindhi speakers living in India (not counting Kutchi speakers, who are sometimes seen as speaking a Sindhi dialect). There are also sizable Sindhi Hindu communities elsewhere in the world, sometimes termed, the 'Sindhi diaspora'.