Americans in India comprise expatriates and immigrants from the United States living in India, along with Indian citizens of American descent. They have a history stretching back to the late 18th century.
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History
During World War II, more than 400,000 American soldiers were sent to India.
After the end of British colonial rule in India in 1947, the "colonial third culture" surrounding employment, which featured expatriates in superior roles, natives in subordinate roles, and little informal socialisation between the two, began to be replaced with a "co-ordinate third culture", based around the common social life of Americans working in multinational corporations and their Indian colleagues. Americans who came to India for work slowly assimilated into this culture. Many companies in those days found they had difficulty retaining American employees with children; they found educational facilities at the high school level to be inadequate.
In a break from the long tradition of older American expatriates coming to India to manage local subsidiaries of American companies, a trend began in the 2000s of younger Americans taking jobs at Indian companies, especially in the information technology sector, often at lower wages than they had previously earned in the U.S. In 2006 there were estimated to be roughly 800 American immigrants working in high-tech companies in India.
Numbers
In 2002, one widely cited estimate stated that 60,000 Americans lived in India. However, exact numbers were difficult to come by because many did not register with the embassy. Some media reports around the time of the 2008 U.S. presidential election stated that 10,000 Americans lived in India at the time. However this conflicted with another figure given by the head of the U.S. consulate in Mumbai, who estimated that there were 9,000 living in Mumbai and its surroundings alone.
Most Popular hangouts in New Delhi for American Expats
New Delhi being home to the American Embassy and the capital of India always attracts American expats in large numbers. Most of the Americans in New Delhi are either career diplomats or associated with American multinationals conducting business in India. New Delhi and the greater NCR (National Capital Region) area offers a plethora of choices for Americans to hang out.
In fiction
Fictional portrayals include Paul Theroux's The Elephanta Suite, which invokes the "Ugly American" stereotype in each of the three novellas therein. Outsourced aired on NBC during the 2010 television season, depicting an American manager at a call center in Mumbai.
Education
American schools in India include:
Notable individuals
This is a list of current and former U.S. citizens whose notability is related to their residence in India.