Refugees in India
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India has seen large influx of refugee populations throughout history.
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[edit] Zoroastrian refugees from Persia
See also: Qissa-i Sanjan
Around the 8th century CE, after the fall of the Sassanid empire, large numbers of Persians fled by ship to the western coast of the Indian subcontinent (now Gujarat) to maintain their Zoroastrian religious tradition. According to an old Parsi legend, the Raja of Sanjan had given them a cup full to the rim of milk, symbolically stating that the kingdom was already full of people and could not take any refugees. The asylum seekers sweetened the milk with sugar and gave it back to the king, symbolically stating that they would be of immeasurable service to the kingdom and become exemplary subjects of the Raja. The Raja allowed them to stay, on condition that they remained endogamous and adopted the local culture, in addition to preserving their religion, as well as forbidding them from proselytizing. This was probably in conformance with caste laws of the time.
To this day, the Parsis remain generally endogamous and do not accept converts. The next record of Parsis in India show that when the kingdom was under the attack of the Muslims, many Parsi soldiers died to defend the kingdom. The survivors fled to a cave, taking the sacred fire with them.
[edit] Partition of India
Massive population exchanges occurred between the two newly-formed nations in the months immediately following Partition. Once the lines were established, about 14.5 million people crossed the borders to what they hoped was the relative safety of religious majority. Based on 1951 Census of displaced persons, 7.226 million Muslims went to Pakistan from India while 7.249 million Hindus, Sikhs moved to India from Pakistan immediately after partition. About 11.2 million or 78% of the population transfer was on the west, with Punjab accounting for most of it; 5.3 million Muslims moved from India to West Punjab in Pakistan, 3.4 million Hindus and Sikhs moved from Pakistan to East Punjab in India; elsewhere in the west 1.2 million moved in each direction to and from Sind. The initial population transfer on the east involved 3.5 million Hindus moving from East Bengal to India and only 0.7 million Muslims moving the other way.
[edit] Tibetan refugees
Following the footsteps of Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama more than 80,000 Tibetan refugees have fled to India during the past 40 years. Peoples' Republic of China entered Tibet as early as 1950 according to some historians and began consolidation of control over Tibet during the reign of the young 14th Dalai Lama. The flash point came in March 1959 when Chinse forces tried to disperse a crowd in front of the Norbulingka palace where Dalai Lama was staying. Consequent upon this Dalai Lama with his nearly 85,000 supporters fled to India and sought asylum. After a series of discussions between the Dalai Lama and Jawaharlal Nehru it was decided to provide all assistance to the Tibetan Refugees to settle down in India for some time, till their eventual return (as it was visualized at that time). Accordingly Government of Mysore (as Karnataka state was called at that time) allotted nearly 3000 acres of land at Bylakuppe in Mysore district in Karnataka in 1960 and the first ever Tibetan exile settlement namely Lugsung Samdupling came into existence in 1961. A few years later another settlement namely Tibetan Dickey Larsoe also called as TDLwas established. This was folowed by the establishment of three more settlements in Karnataka state making it the state with the largest Tibetan refuee population. Rabgayling settlement was created in Gurupuravillage near Hunsur, Dhondenling was established at Oderapalya near Kollegal and Doeguling settlement came into being at Mundgod in Uttara Kannada district all in the southern Indian state of Karnataka. At present the population of the Tibetan reugees in India is estimated to be around 120,000.
[edit] Refugees from East Pakistan and Bangladesh
During the Bangladesh Liberation War, the Bangladesh-India border was opened to allow the tortured and panic-stricken Bengalis safe shelter in India. The governments of West Bengal, Bihar, Assam, Meghalaya and Tripura established refugee camps along the border. As the massacres in East Pakistan escalated an estimated 10 million refugees fled to India causing financial hardship and instability in that country.
[edit] Afghan refugees
More than 60,000 Afghan refugees came to India in the years following the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Indian government does not officially recognize them as refugees, but has allowed the UNHCR to operate a program for them.
