Key Facts about Tamils
Population, religion, education, diet and notable Tamils worldwide
Tamil population worldwide
🌍
85M+
Total Tamils worldwide
Religion
🛕
87%
Hinduism — largest Tamil faith
✝️
6%
Christianity — strong in South Tamil Nadu
☪️
5%
Islam — Tamil Muslims (Rowther)
🕉️
2%
Other — Jainism, Buddhism, secular
Diet — vegetarian & vegan
🥗
40%
Vegetarian Tamils globally
🍚
60%
Vegetarian in Tamil Nadu
🛕
~100%
Brahmin communities — fully vegetarian
Education — literacy rate by country
🇮🇳 Tamil Nadu, India
Home to IIT Madras, ranked top 300 globally. Over 500 engineering colleges.
🇱🇰 Sri Lanka (Tamil regions)
Among highest literacy rates in South Asia. University of Jaffna is a key institution.
🇲🇾 Malaysia (Tamil community)
Tamil schools (Tamil Sekolah) maintained across Malaysia. Growing university enrollment.
🇸🇬 Singapore (Tamil community)
Tamil is an official language. Strong representation in NUS and NTU.
🇨🇦 Canada (Tamil diaspora)
Tamil Canadians have above-average education levels. Strong in IT, medicine and law.
🇬🇧 United Kingdom (Tamil diaspora)
High academic achievement. Many Tamil professionals in NHS, finance and technology.
🇩🇰 Denmark (Tamil diaspora)
Well-integrated community. High school completion above national average for diaspora groups.
🇿🇦 South Africa (Tamil community)
Long-established Tamil community since 1860. Strong presence in Durban and Johannesburg.
Notable Tamils — science & mathematics
SR
Srinivasa Ramanujan
Self-taught mathematician who revolutionised number theory and infinite series. Collaborated with G.H. Hardy at Cambridge.
🇮🇳 India
SC
Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
Nobel Prize in Physics 1983. Discovered the Chandrasekhar limit — fundamental to understanding black holes.
🇺🇸 USA (born India)
CV
C.V. Raman
Nobel Prize in Physics 1930. Discovered the Raman Effect — scattering of light. Tamil heritage from Tamil Nadu.
🇮🇳 India
GS
G.N. Ramachandran
Structural biologist who described the Ramachandran plot — essential in protein structure research.
🇮🇳 India
Notable Tamils — technology & business
SP
Sundar Pichai
CEO of Google & Alphabet. Born in Madurai, Tamil Nadu. One of the most powerful executives in Silicon Valley.
🇺🇸 USA (born India)
IN
Indra Nooyi
Former CEO of PepsiCo (2006–2018). One of the most powerful businesswomen globally. Born in Chennai.
🇺🇸 USA (born India)
SN
Shantanu Narayen
CEO of Adobe Systems. Born in Hyderabad of Tamil heritage. Led Adobe's transformation to cloud services.
🇺🇸 USA
AN
Arvind Krishna
CEO of IBM since 2020. Tamil heritage. Led IBM's $34 billion acquisition of Red Hat.
🇺🇸 USA (born India)
RS
Rajeev Suri
Former CEO of Nokia. Led the company's turnaround. Tamil heritage from Tamil Nadu.
🇫🇮 Finland
VR
Vivek Ranadivé
Founder of TIBCO Software. Owner of Sacramento Kings NBA team. Tamil heritage.
🇺🇸 USA
Notable Tamils — arts, sport & politics
AR
A.R. Rahman
Composer & musician. Oscar winner for Slumdog Millionaire. Grammy winner. Transformed Tamil and Indian film music.
🇮🇳 India
RK
Rajinikanth
Tamil cinema superstar. One of the highest-paid actors in Asia. Cultural icon with global fan base.
🇮🇳 India
VA
Viswanathan Anand
5× World Chess Champion. First Asian World Chess Champion. Born in Chennai, Tamil Nadu.
🇮🇳 India
MM
Muttiah Muralitharan
Sri Lankan Tamil cricketer. World record holder — 800 Test wickets. Greatest spin bowler in history.
🇱🇰 Sri Lanka
KH
Kamala Harris
45th Vice President of the United States. Her mother Shyamala Gopalan was Tamil Brahmin from Chennai.
🇺🇸 USA
SJ
Sirimavo Bandaranaike
World's first female Prime Minister (Sri Lanka, 1960). Tamil heritage through ancestry.
🇱🇰 Sri Lanka
Sources & references
- Census of India 2021 — Office of the Registrar General & Census Commissioner
- Sri Lanka Department of Census and Statistics (DCS) 2012
- United Nations diaspora population estimates 2020
- UNESCO Institute for Statistics — education data 2022
- Statistics Canada — Tamil diaspora census data 2021
- UK Office for National Statistics — ethnic group data 2021
- Malaysian Department of Statistics — Tamil community 2020
- Singapore Department of Statistics — Tamil population 2020
