sindhi peoples

This article is about the socio-ethnic group of South Asia. For other uses, see Sindhi.

Sindhis
سنڌي

1st row: Ubaidullah Sindhi 2nd row: Benazir Bhutto, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, J. B. Kripalani 3rd row: Jhulelal, Abida Parveen, Shaikh Ayaz
Regions with significant populations
Pakistan 53,410,910 (August 2011) [1]  India 2,810,000 (August 2001) [2]  Hong Kong 7,500 [3]
Languages
Sindhi
Religion
• Islam • Hinduism
Related ethnic groups
• Balochi people • Kashmiri people

This article contains Sindhi text, written from right to left with some letters joined. Without proper rendering support, you may see unjoined letters written left-to-right, instead of right-to-left or other symbols instead of Sindhi script.

Sindhis (Sindhi: سنڌي) are a Sindhi-speaking ethnic group of people native to the Sindh province of Pakistan.
Some of the places in Sindh have been inhabited as early as the 3rd millennium BC. A large number of Indus valley sites have been found in Sindh. Sindh was ruled by Hindu, Buddhist and Zoroastrian kingdoms till 712, when it became a part of the Umayyad Caliphate. While Sindhis were originally Hindus or Buddhists.
Sindhi culture is highly influenced by Sufi doctrines and principles. Some of the popular cultural icons are Raja Dahir, Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai, Lal Shahbaz Qalandar, Jhulelal and Sachal Sarmast.
Following the partition of India in 1947, most Hindus, Sikhs and Jains migrated to India and other parts of the world, though as of 1998, Hindus still constituted about 6% of the total Sindhi population in Pakistan.^[4] Sindhis in different parts of the world formed their own social gatherings or sammelans and associations.