figure). Makeshift icons of protector deities such as Maturai Vı ̄ran
̄
or
Man
̄
math were implanted. Also common were shrines to Ma ̄riamman
̄, the
goddess of smallpox, rain, and fertility. Those workers who were not farmers
- those who worked in husbandry, construction, clearing of land, etc. –
preferred shrines to Ka ̄lı ̄yamman
̄
, the goddess who protected and presided
over the work of hewing and shepherding (and who had been part of the
Tamil pantheon since the thirteenth century).
These laborers and their bosses were joined by the start of the twentieth
century by Indians who came voluntarily seeking better work opportuni-
ties – Sikhs often working in security positions, Sindhı ̄s or Guja ̄ratis usually
in business, Ceylon Tamils who worked in civil service and the professions,
Tamil Chettiars who were the bankers and money lenders. Many of these
Indians or their descendants stayed, so that in Singapore today some
6 percent of the population is Indian (primarily Tamil) and in Malaysia
some 10 percent is Indian (roughly 90 percent of them Tamil). Similarly,
this combination of indentured and voluntary migration of South Asians
has meant that a significant percentage of the population in several coun-
tries around the world today is of South Asian descent, especially those
of Mauritius, Trinidad, Guyana, Myanmar, Fiji, and South Africa. The volun-
tary eastern migration of Indians throughout the twentieth century has
led to pockets of Indian settlers in areas where they believed they could
make a better life for themselves – Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, as
well as Malaysia, and Singapore. Nonetheless, in Malaysia especially, the
vast majority of the Indian population is descended from the inden-
tured servants brought originally to the plantations. Indeed, Indians in
Malaysia own slightly more than 1 percent of Malaysia’s wealth, and
90 percent of that is in the hands of the top 10 percent of the Indian
Malaysian population. The other 90 percent live at a level below a hypo-
thetical poverty line.^10
The religious life of these communities is as diverse as their cultural roots.
Generally speaking, however, many of them have found religion to be one
of the ways to express their ethnic identity. They are engaged in various
forms of reinterpretation of their own heritage – following gurus who are
perceived to represent their values; meeting together for study, orations,
or song fests; and sharing family traditions with one another. Not least
important, they are engaged in building or upgrading temples, gurdwa ̄ra ̄s,
or mosques which become social-cultural spaces where they can present
to their children and themselves a sense of their heritage. These shrines
help provide a sense of place and permanence to those who have migrated
into new societies quite removed from their homeland. And, as with their
counterparts who remain in India, ritual forms a significant dimension of
their religious expression insofar as ritual enacts and embodies the sense
India’s Global Reach 227