15 - Indians in Tokyo and Its Vicinity

Summary

INTRODUCTION

“Rising India” paints a country of more than one billion people, with rapid economic development, and well-known for IT and biotechnology. Many IT engineers have moved from India to other countries including Japan. In Japan Indians who work in IT industry have increased since 1990s and many of them tend to stay on. They are the embodiment of “rising India” in a globalizing world.

However, during the author's interaction with them for this research, some aspects were noticed, which cannot be explained with “rising India”. They maintained their own religious practices, connection with their home town/village, meals, and dress in Japan. They have formed their own community, which help them keep their own lifestyle and identity. Members of the community are not only IT engineers, but also workers at farms, factories, and restaurants.

The term “rising India” is a reminder that India is in the process of becoming an advanced country. Yet, that represents only a certain part of India or Indians. From the life of people coming from India to Japan, we can find other characteristics of Indians.

This chapter focuses on their communities in Tokyo. Descriptions about them are based on interviews and participant observations of some aspects of their life. The subject of South Asian diaspora is closely related to “rising India”. Shukla (2001) has noted that the term “South Asia” faces problematic duality consisting of global and local, nation and transnational community. These topics connect with the complexity of the South Asian diaspora, consisting of differences in religion, background of migration, and experience of social life (Shukla 2001). In Japan, too, people from India and the other countries of South Asia experience the same situation. We can see multiple formations of their communities, which derive from their complexity. The category “South Asia” gives us opportunity to think about the other aspects of “rising India”.

Figures 15.1 and 15.2 show the recent increase of Indians in Japan. Since the 1990s, the number of Indians living in Japan has been rapidly increasing (Figure 15.1). In the prefectural change of the Indian population, almost every prefecture shows growth. Especially in Tokyo and its vicinity, this trend is all the more apparent. The industrial midland areas also display similar tendencies (Figure 15.2).