Sinhalese People - Geographic Distribution - Outside Sri Lanka

Outside Sri Lanka

As with many of the people from former colonies, Sinhalese have emigrated to several countries. There are small communities in the UK, Australia, United States and Canada with Sinhalese ancestry. In addition to this there are many Sinhalese, who reside in the above mentioned countries and countries in the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Europe, temporarily in connection with employment and education. They are often employed as guest workers in the Middle East and professionals in the other regions.

Australia

The 2006 Census in Australia found that there were approximately 29,055 Sinhalese Australians (0.1 percent of the population). That was an addition of 8,395 Sinhalese Australians (a 40.6 percent increase) from the 2001 Census. There are 73,849 Australians (0.4 of the population) who reported having Sinhalese ancestry in 2006. This was 26 percent more in 2001, in which 58,602 Australia reported having Sinhalese ancestry. The census is counted by Sri Lankans who speak the Sinhalese language at home.

Census data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 2004 reported that Sinhalese Australians are by religion 29.7 percent Catholic; 8.0 percent Anglican, 9.9 percent other Christian; 46.9 percent "Other Religions" (mainly Buddhist), and 5.5 percent no religion. The Sinhalese language was also reported to be the 29th-fastest-growing language in Australia (ranking above Somali but behind Hindi and Belarusian).

Sinhalese Australians have an exceptionally low rate of return migration to Sri Lanka. In December 2001, the Department of Foreign Affairs estimated that there were 800 Australian citizens resident in Sri Lanka. It is unclear whether these were returning Sri Lankan emigrants with Australian citizenship, their Sri Lankan Australian children, or other Australians present on business or for some other reason.

Canada

In the 2001 Canadian census, 10,000 people identified themselves as of Sinhalese ancestry, out of 62,000 Sri Lankans.

India

There are a small amount of Sinhalese people in India, scattered all around the country, but mainly living in and around the northern and southern regions. Delhi has the largest concentration of Sinhalese people with 1,100, the states of Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra have 800 and 400 respectively. The Andaman and Nicobar Islands and the state of Gujarat have 200 each while other states such as Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka, West Bengal, Jharkhand have populations ranging from 60 to 30 people.

Italy

It is estimated that there are 30,000-33,000 Sinhalese in Italy. The major Sinhalese communities in Italy are located in Lombardia (In the districts Loreto and Lazzaretto), Milan, Lazio, Rome, Naples and Southern Italy (Particularly Palermo, Messina and Catania). Most Italian Sinhalese work as domestic workers. But they have also opened businesses such as restaurants, cleaning enterprises (e.g. Cooperativa Multietnica di Pulizie Sud-Est), call centres, video-shops, traditional food shops and minimarkets.

Many Sinhalese have migrated to Italy since the 1970s. Italy was attractive to the Sinhalese due to perceived easier employment opportunities and entry, compared to other European countries.

In the late 1970s, Sinhalese Catholic women migrated to Italy to work in elderley homes. This was followed by a wave of Sinhalese migrants who worked for Italian entrepreneurs in the early 1980s. Italy was often seen as a temporary destination, but many Sinhalese decided to settle there. Many Sinhalese have also illegally migrated to Italy, mainly through the Balkans and Austria.

Admission acts also encouraged more Sinhalese to migrate to Italy. For example, the Dini Decree in 1996 made it more easier for Sinhalese workers to bring their family to Italy. In Rome, Naples and Milan, the Sinhalese have built up "enlarged families", where jobs are exchanged among relatives and compatriots.

The Sinhalese prefer to send their children to English speaking countries for their education and consider Italian education mediocre.

The major organisation representing the Sinhalese in Italy is the Sri Lanka Association Italy.

New Zealand

The early arrivals to come to New Zealand from what was then British Ceylon were a few prospectors attracted to the gold rushes. By 1874 there were a mere 33 New Zealand residents born in Ceylon.

After 1950 under the Colombo Plan some students and trainees received education in New Zealand. Up until the late 1960s the number of New Zealand residents born in Ceylon remained static. As a demand for skilled professionals in New Zealand grew it led to a noticeable increase in the number of immigrants about this time. Racial and economic tensions in Dominion of Ceylon, made worse after the declaration of the republic in 1972, also swelled immigrant numbers.

In 1983 the Sri Lankan Civil War began with Sinhalese political dominance being challenged by the militant Tamil Tigers, who sought a separate Tamil state within Sri Lanka. After the 1983 riots in Sri Lanka ushered in an extended civil war many Sri Lankans, both Tamil and Sinhalese, fled Sri Lanka, the number of arrivals from Sri Lanka to New Zealand and the Sri Lankan-born population in New Zealand rose dramatically.

The numbers arriving continued to increase, and at the 2006 census there were over 7,000 Sri Lankans living in New Zealand.

Sri Lankan New Zealanders comprised 3% of the Asian population of New Zealand in 2001. Out of the Asians, the Sri Lankans were the most likely to hold a formal qualification and to work in white-collar occupations. Sri Lankans mainly worked in health professions, business and property services, and the retail and manufacturing sectors, in large numbers. Most lived in Auckland and Wellington, with smaller populations in Waikato, Manawatu, Canterbury and others.

United Kingdom

Now there are many Sri Lankan associations in the United Kingdom. The Sinhalese community is well represented by many old boys associations of prominent schools in Sri Lanka and many temple organizations associated with Buddhist and Hindu temples represent both Sinhala and Tamil communities in the UK. Though Sinhala people in particular and Sri Lankans in general have migrated to the UK over the centuries beginning from the colonial times, the number of Sinhalese people in the UK cannot be estimated accurately due to inadequacies of census in the UK. The UK government does not record statistics on the basis of language or ethnicity and all Sri Lankans are classified into one group as Asian British or Asian Other.

The Sinhalese have not neglected the use of Sinhala language in the UK. For the Sinhala readers, the newspaper Lanka Viththi (Information on Lanka) was created in 1997 to provide Sinhala reading materials for the Sinhalese UK community. This particular monthly newspaper, first of its kind outside Sri Lanka, celebrates its successful survival in abroad. Available:

In 2006, a Sinhala TV channel called Kesara TV was set up in London to provide the Sinhala speaking people of the UK a TV channel in Sinhala.

. This development in entertainment industry had a short life which resulted in the dissolvement of the company in 2009.

Some of the Sinhalese community have been against the public display of support for the LTTE in the 2009 Tamil Diaspora protests in Westminster, London. Some of the Sinhalese community in the UK have faced violence from some British Sri Lankan tamils over the ethnic conflict in the Sri Lankan Civil War. Several Sinhala owned Fried Chicken Shops in North London and a Sinhalese Buddhist temple in Kingsbury were vandalised in 2009.

United States

The Sinhalese number about 12,000 in USA. The New York City Metropolitan Area contains the largest Sri Lankan community in the United States, receiving the highest legal permanent resident Sri Lankan immigrant population, followed by Central New Jersey and the Los Angeles metropolitan area.