The Diversity Of India On Many Fronts

One must realize that India simply cannot be generalized as Apu from The Simpsons. In fact, there is so much diversity in the country that it is a miracle it functions cohesively at all.

First, with ethnicities, the People of India Project (beginning in 1985) identified 4635 different ethnic groups or communities.¹ In relation to ethnicity, the 2011 Indian census seems to suggest that there are 4.6 million castes and sub-castes. But even the methodology of identifying castes becomes debatable, and one scholar claims that there are multiple caste systems with different understandings of positioning.²

Going beyond caste, religion is also a diverse arena in India. Although nearly 80% of Indians adhere to Hinduism, 14.2% are Muslims, 2.3% are Christians, and 1.7% are Sikhs.³ Considering the fact that India’s population has over a billion people, these seemingly small percentages of other religions add up substantially in absolute terms (e.g. Muslims would make up 100 million people in India).

Another diverse factor is India’s languages. According to Ethnologue, there are 462 listed languages in the country where 448 of them are still living.⁴ Even when you observe the states, it is found that many of them have their own separate languages (e.g. Kannada for Karnataka and Tamil for Tamil Nadu). Contrary to initial belief, Hindi is spoken only by 41% of the population while 14 other official languages exist.²

With various languages, ethnic groups, and religions, India proves itself to be incredibly diverse in its demographic composition.