Malaysian Indians or Indo-Malaysians are Malaysian citizens of Indian ancestry. Most are descendants of those who migrated from India to British Malaya from the mid-19th to the mid-20th centuries. Most Malaysian Indians are ethnic Tamils; smaller groups include the Malayalees, Telugus and Punjabis. Malaysian Indians form the fifth-largest community of Overseas Indians in the world. In Malaysia, they represent the third-largest group, constituting 7% of the Malaysian population, after the Bumiputera (combined grouping of ethnic Malays and other indigenous groups) and the Chinese. They are usually referred to simply as "Indians" in English, Orang India in Malay, "Yin du ren" in Chinese.
Malaysia's Indian population is notable for its class stratification, with a significant elite and a large low income group within its fold. Malaysian Indians large percentage of professionals per capita by constituting 15.5% of Malaysia's professionals in 1999 has been reduced with substantial population close to 40% is now considered the B40 category. In the 1984 census, up to 38% of the nation's medical professional workforce consisted of Malaysian Indians, but this has been since been reduced. In 1970, the per-capita income of Malaysian Indians was 76% higher than that of the Malay majority. Despite attempts by the Malaysian government to redistribute wealth since the 1970s through institutionalized racial policy, by 2005 Malaysian Indians still earned a 27% higher per capita income than that of the dominant Malay community.
