Washington: Indians, who fall in the second-largest immigrant group in the US, are said to have been facing racial discrimination and polarisation on regular basis, due to bias based on skin colour. According to a survey, people born in the US were found to be more likely to report discrimination than immigrants.
The survey 'Social Realities of Indian Americans: Results from the 2020 Indian American Attitudes Survey' that released on Wednesday was conducted by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Johns Hopkins-SAIS, and the University of Pennsylvania. The research analytics firm YouGov was also part of the collaboration.
Around three-quarters of Indian-Americans have religion as an important part of their lives, found the survey. The report says that 47% of the participants pray at least once a day, and 27% attend religious services at least once a week.
Almost half of the Hindu respondents identified with a caste. Foreign-born participants were found to be significantly more attached to the caste identity. Eight in ten people with a caste identity belong to a general or upper caste. Higher rates of marriage within the community were also reported. Findings indicated that the networks of Indian-Americans tend to be more homogeneous in terms of religion than their counterparts living in India.
Religious polarisation is often connected to political preferences in India as well as in American society. The report clarified that democratic Indian-Americans are less likely to have close friends who are republicans. The same pattern is reflected among BJP-supporters and Congress Party supporters.
The report says that divisions in India are being reproduced within the Indian-American community based on religion, political leadership, and political parties. However, only a minority of respondents were concerned about political division from India reaching American soil.
People born in the US exhibited the highest chances of engaging in politics and other civic metrics. It is followed by foreign-born US citizens and non-citizens.
Indian-Americans are the second-largest immigrant group in the US. The nationally representative online survey included 1,200 Indian-Americans. A little over 1% of the total population in the US are Indian-Americans. As per the data from 2018, there are 4.2 million people of Indian origin in the US. And less than 1% of them are registered voters.