It’s a question that pops up every few years on social media, in NRI living rooms, and in late‑night WhatsApp debates. It comes loaded with emotion, history, and a sense of “this keeps happening to us”.
But when you look closely, the story is more complicated than “the world hates Indians”. What we actually see—again and again—is a small, visible, economically successful minority becoming the easiest scapegoat when politicians need someone to blame.
Let’s walk through this as a story, not a rant.
The railway workers who became “too successful”
In the late 19th and early 20th century, the British Empire shipped thousands of Indians from Punjab and Gujarat to East Africa. Their job: build railways in places like Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
Once the railway lines were done, many of these workers didn’t come back.
They stayed.
They opened small shops, became traders and moneylenders, moved into wholesale, logistics, and later into professions. Over time, their children became doctors, lawyers, teachers, accountants. In country after country, a pattern emerged:
- A very small Indian-origin minority in terms of population.
- A very large share of business ownership and professional roles.
By the late 1960s and early 1970s in Uganda, people of South Asian origin were roughly around 1% of the population but controlled a big chunk of the country’s private businesses and formal trade. They ran shops, factories, mills, transport firms—essentially a lot of the economic “plumbing” of day-to-day life.
To the outside eye, it looked like this small community owned “everything”.
That is the first ingredient in our story: a tiny, tightly knit, economically powerful minority.
Idi Amin and the 90‑day deadline
Enter Idi Amin.
In 1971, Amin seized power in Uganda. To secure his rule, he needed to look like a hero to the majority population. One tried-and-tested way for leaders to do this is to create a villain—a visible “other” to blame for every frustration in society.
In 1972, he did something extreme: he gave Uganda’s Asians—most of them of Indian or Pakistani origin—90 days to leave the country.
His speeches played the greatest hits of economic scapegoating:
- “They are taking your jobs.”
- “They are controlling your economy.”
- “They are not loyal to this country.”
Businesses owned by Asians were expropriated and handed over to Ugandan nationals. Families who had lived there for generations were forced to pack their lives into a couple of suitcases and leave. Many went to the UK, Canada and other countries as refugees, starting again from scratch in yet another land.
From a distance, we remember it as: “Indians became too rich, the country hated them, and they got thrown out.”
But underneath that are very human layers:
- A majority population feeling poor, frustrated, and left out.
- A minority that looks different, lives differently, and seems to be doing “too well”.
- A leader who chooses the easy political move: blame the minority, not the system.
It’s not a uniquely “Indian” story. You’ll find similar patterns with Jewish communities in Europe, Chinese communities in Southeast Asia, and many other diasporas around the world.
Burma: when your entire business disappears overnight
Something similar—though with its own twist—played out in Burma (now Myanmar).
During British rule, Indians had migrated to Burma in huge numbers. They worked as labourers, clerks, traders, moneylenders, and later moved into urban professions. By the mid‑20th century, there were millions of people of Indian origin living in Burma. Many had never even seen India.
Then, in the 1960s, General Ne Win and the military took power.
They launched a “Burmese Way to Socialism” which meant: nationalising private businesses, cracking down on “foreign” capital, and reshaping the economy under state control. Indian-owned shops, factories and businesses were among the first to be hit. Overnight, people who had built businesses over decades saw them seized without compensation.
For many Indian families, it was the end of a chapter:
- Some boarded ships and flights arranged by the Indian government and returned to India with almost nothing.
- Others tried to stay on and somehow rebuild.
- Roughly a few hundred thousand Indians left over the following years, many feeling they had been punished for their success and for not being “Burman enough” in a newly nationalist state.
Again, the pattern is familiar:
- A visible minority that is economically active and relatively prosperous.
- A political shift that mixes nationalism, socialism and “take back our economy” sentiment.
- The minority community becomes collateral damage.
So… does everyone actually hate Indians?
Here’s where we need to be careful.
It’s tempting, when you hear stories of Uganda and Burma, to jump to: “Whenever Indians get rich in a country, they’re eventually thrown out.”
But that’s not quite true.
Look at:
- The United States: Indian Americans are among the highest-earning ethnic groups, with median household incomes far above the national average.
- The United Kingdom: Indian-origin households are near the top in terms of earnings and educational attainment.
- Australia: India-born Australians top income charts among migrant groups.
Yet, there has been no mass expulsion. No 90-day deadlines. No state-led confiscation of all Indian-owned businesses.
What you do see, though, are softer versions of the same tension:
- Arguments around H‑1B visas: “They’re taking our tech jobs.”
- Complaints about outsourcing: “Our work is going to Indian IT companies.”
- Slogans like “Make X country great again” that often come with undertones of “there are too many immigrants”.
So the reality is more nuanced:
- Many countries actively want Indian talent—for tech, medicine, academia, entrepreneurship.
- At the same time, parts of their population and political class feel threatened or left behind and look at successful immigrant groups with suspicion or resentment.
The question is less “Why does the world hate Indians?” and more “Why do economically successful minorities so often become targets?”
Why do Indian communities so often end up in this “elite but vulnerable” role?
Let’s be honest about ourselves for a second.
Across history and geography, you see some recurring traits in Indian-origin communities abroad:
- Entrepreneurial drive
Indians have a long track record of setting up shops, trading businesses, and services wherever they land—whether that’s East Africa, Southeast Asia, the Gulf, the UK, or Silicon Valley. - Willingness to migrate
From indentured labourers on colonial plantations to today’s software engineers and doctors, Indians have been willing to leave home, cross oceans, and build a life in unfamiliar places. - Joint families and tight networks
Capital, labour, and support often come from within the extended family or community: one person migrates, pulls in cousins; they pool savings to start a business; everybody works in it; kids are pushed towards education and professional careers. - Relentless focus on education
In the US, UK, Australia and elsewhere, Indian-origin communities are heavily overrepresented in STEM, medicine, finance, and other high-income fields. First-generation sacrifice becomes second-generation prosperity.
These are the exact same strengths that:
- Make Indian communities rise quickly up the economic ladder abroad.
- Make them highly visible if local majorities are struggling and looking for someone to blame.
It’s not that “Indians are uniquely hated”. It’s that any group that combines:
- Strong economic success,
- Cultural distinctiveness, and
- Weak political protection
…is at risk when the political winds turn.
Indians have often been that group in certain times and places.
Politics, fear and the art of finding a scapegoat
Behind all of this sits a simple political formula:
- The majority feels economic pain—unemployment, inflation, inequality, corruption.
- Fixing the real causes is hard, slow, and unpopular.
- A leader comes along and says, “You are suffering because of them.”
- “Them” is usually a group that is: visible, different, and doing better financially than the average person.
Sometimes “them” is immigrants in general. Sometimes it’s Muslims. Sometimes it’s Jews, Chinese, Mexicans, or in our examples, Indians.
When it works, it gives the leader power, applause, and a sense of being a “strong protector of the people”. The minority pays the price—through discrimination, violence, legal restrictions, or in extreme cases, expulsion.
This is why what happened to Indians in Uganda and Burma is deeply serious, but also not entirely unique. It’s part of a much older pattern of how societies handle inequality, fear, and political opportunism.
Key episodes at a glance
Here’s a quick table summarising some of the major episodes you referenced or alluded to:
| Place / Period | What Indians Were Doing | What Triggered Backlash | What Happened to Indians |
|---|---|---|---|
| East Africa (late 1800s–1970s) | Initially railway workers, then traders, shopkeepers, professionals, business owners | Rising African nationalism, economic inequality, resentment of Asian commercial dominance | Restrictions, discrimination in several countries; major expulsion in Uganda under Idi Amin |
| Uganda (1972) | Tiny minority owning much of formal trade and businesses | Idi Amin’s need for popularity; narrative that Asians “stole jobs” and “controlled the economy” | 60,000–70,000 Asians (mostly of Indian origin) given 90 days to leave; businesses expropriated |
| Burma/Myanmar (1960s–1970s) | Long-established Indian community active in trade, moneylending, professions | Military coup; “Burmese Way to Socialism”; drive to nationalise foreign and private capital | Indian businesses nationalised; hundreds of thousands left or were forced to leave, many returning to India |
| Western countries today (US, UK, Australia, etc.) | High-income professionals in tech, medicine, finance; entrepreneurs; students | Debates over immigration, job competition, outsourcing, “culture change” | No mass expulsions; mix of admiration, reliance on talent, and sporadic anti-immigrant or anti-outsourcing sentiment |
| Gulf states (1970s–today) | Massive Indian workforce from labourers to professionals and executives | Periodic economic downturns, localisation policies (“nationalisation” of jobs) | Visa and residency rules tightened; some job losses and return migration, but Indians still heavily present |
This isn’t an exhaustive list, but it shows the repeated structure: economic prominence + political tension = risk.
So how should we think about this as Indians?
Maybe the most useful way to hold this is with two truths at once:
- Truth 1: Indian communities abroad have genuinely faced discrimination, violence and even expulsion in some countries when they became economically successful and politically vulnerable. The pain, trauma and injustice are real.
- Truth 2: It is not some universal law that “the world hates Indians”. Many countries respect and rely on Indian talent and entrepreneurship, even if there are pockets of resentment and political games.
Reducing everything to “they hate us because we’re successful” can feel emotionally satisfying, but it also blinds us to:
- The real structural issues in those societies.
- Our own blind spots in how we integrate, build bridges, and participate in local public life.
- The possibility of building alliances and institutions that protect minorities instead of just hoping for the best.
The story here is not just about Indians. It’s about what happens when any community:
- Works hard, rises fast, and
- Doesn’t yet have the political power or narrative control to protect itself when things turn ugly.
