INTRODUCTION

Among the countries of Southeast Asia, the three Indochina countries have the least number of Indians. Interestingly these countries were exposed to the Indian culture as early as the beginning of the Christian era, though their contact with India had declined after the thirteenth century. Today, the situation of the Indian communities in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos presents a contrasting study. While these countries and India have enjoyed close political relations throughout the period of their independence and extended to each other the fullest diplomatic support in their respective needy hours, the size of the Indian communities or their influence in all three countries is very small. Ironically, during the colonial period the Indian communities were sizeable. After the communist victory in 1975 in Vietnam and the reunification of North and South Vietnam when India-Vietnam relations began to strengthen further, there was an exodus of Indians from Vietnam and Laos. Very few of them returned to resume their business or professional activity. In Cambodia, a large number of Indians left after the coup in 1971 and did not return even when India recognized the Cambodian regime in 1980 after the Vietnamese occupation.

There are two groups of Indians in these countries. Those from the pre- 1975 days and the other from the post-1975 period. The former are now very few. Today the Indian presence in Indochina countries has little to do with the Indian communities which lived there in the nineteenth and twentieth century French period. The Indians one sees and meets in Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia are those who have come here in the last ten to fifteen years or even more recently. They are mostly connected with the emerging India and seem to represent the enterprise and energy that young Indian businessmen and professionals are showing everywhere to explore new areas and markets.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

As we speak of the Indian communities in today's Vietnam, Cambodia or Laos, it will be instructive to briefly look at the historical background of India's presence in these countries as Indochina is one of the regions where the Indian civilization had reached as early as the first century A.D. The Indianization of Southeast Asia, referred to by Western scholars as “Farther India” was a saga which lasted for more than a millennium in which Indian religion, art, architecture, dance forms, literature, etc., left an indelible imprint.