A discussion on Indian last names. Explains why some Indians want you to call them by their last names, why that girl you know and her fiance have the same last name, why Singh and Patel are such common surnames and a host of other things you have wondered about Indian names but were too shy to ask.

The basic reason is that most Indians do not have family names . Faced with having to come up with a last name, Indians have resorted to various means to get last names. Some of these are so common that most people do not even realize that they have had to , in effect, discover their last names ...

Common methods of arriving at a last name

1. Caste names . Mohandas Gandhi , Independence era Indian leader belonged to the caste of Gandhis ("grocers" -- he was a lawyer before he became a political leader; caste names do not necessarily indicate occupation). This is very much like Western last names like Carpenter and Smith until you realize most Indians tend to marry within their caste. Gandhi's wife's maiden name, mother's maiden name and grandmother's maiden name were all probably Gandhi too even if they came from unrelated families. Caste names are not really family names. e.g. Patel, Iyer, Mudaliar are all caste names.
2. Subcaste names . Balgangadhar Tilak another Independence era leader's last name belongs to this category. This is more common among castes, that like the Brahmins, are spread throughout the country. People of different subcastes may intermarry; hence, these are even more like Western last names. However, while you can say a Schindberg is Jewish, can you tell which tribe of Israel he belongs to? e.g. Kamath and Shenoy are both Konkani Brahmin last names ..
3. Religion . Zail Singh , one of India's ex-presidents was a Sikh scholar. Sikhs, followers of a faith founded during the Moghul rule in India, often have the middle name Singh and a last name that belongs to their clan (Sikhs don't have castes) or town e.g. batting sensation Navjot Singh Siddhu. But some Sikhs may drop the clan name... and Singh then becomes the last name! Similarly, Jains, followers of Mahavir a contemporary of the Buddha, have the last name Jain. Consequently, they share their last name with a whole religion, not just a caste ... Singh, on the other hand, is the preferred surname of several North Indian Hindus and is not exclusively used by Sikhs. An interesting note: Sikh women may have the last name Kaur. Thus, within a family, you have two last names!
4. Town Name . Maharajapuram Santhanam , the late Carnatic singer was from the town of Maharajapuram. His given name was Santhanam. His not so famous son is Maharajapuram Ganesh... This is common among artistes of the Carnatic music tradition and people from Andhra Pradesh. People migrating out West sometimes invert the order, thus attaining names similar in origin to that of Louis D'Amato. Others (e.g. Maharashtrians) add suffixes such as "kar" to the name of their town before using it as a last name.
5. Descriptive Many Keralites esp. Syrian Christians use as their last name the "tharavaad" -- a description of their ancestral home. I can't think of any famous examples but names like Pramod Perumparambil and Paul Chemmanoor (the guy who brought it to my attention) fall under this category.
6. Only given name . R.K. Narayan , Indian writer of English fiction goes by the name Narayan. His brother, an equally famous cartoonist, is R.K. Laxman. The R.K. connotes the family they come from but Narayan's son will have the name K.N. Something. Got the idea? This is common among South Indians and is how my name goes. Lev Nikolaevitch Tolstoy, the Russian author of War and Peace, had he been South Indian would have been named N.Lev :)
7. Inverted Patronym . Chitra Visweswaran is a dancer whose last name is either a patronym or the given name of her husband. More common among women, the inverted patronym is also adopted by people migrating out West who want to be called by their given names without having to explain like I do ... Their last names are then the given names of their fathers / husbands. This is common among South Indians.
8. Split Names . Kishore Kumar , Hindi filmdom's melodious voice had one of those names that is very easy to split. The second part becomes a convenient last name. This is also common among Muslims with two names. e.g. Abdul Kalam, the Indian Space researcher.
9. Invented Family Name . Jawaharlal Nehru , India's first Prime Minister had an invented family name. Nehru was a family name adopted by his father when they arrived in Allahabad from Kashmir. Thus, his wife's maiden name was not Nehru. This is obviously an exception to the statement that Indians do not have last names. Another example is the name of Rajesh Pilot, Indian ex-minister, who attached his surname after a stint in the Indian Air Force.

Notable exceptions

1. Invented Family Names such as that of Jawaharlal Nehru and Rajesh Pilot.
2. The Anglo last name of Anglo-Indians -- desendants of British and Indian parents.
3. Portugese-Goan last names like Fernandes.
4. Syrian-Christian last names like Verghese are actually Malayali renderings of the Hebrew/Greek originals (eg. Verghese is George). Since these would be first names of some forefather several generations back, we could call these last names. They do not change from generation to generation and are family-specific.
5. Third or later generation expatriate Indians and others who now have last names that were the given names of one of their ancestors or have intermarried enough to ensure that the last names are not caste/religion names in disguise.

wrote:

>I am sure a lot of you had to explain to your western
>counterparts why your first and last names are switched.
>It seems only Tamils do this. The North Indians, the Telugus,
>and the Sinhalese use a last name. Any reason why the Tamils
>do not use a last name? Did they ever use a last name? Is it
>a western tradition only?

Many Tamils use a "vilasam". That gives the initials (and in Tamil, the first letter is actually a syllable) of all your paternal ancestors upto, say, 7 generations. This keeps every one readily identifiable. For e.g., in a reasonably-sized community,

Mu.Ko.Ka.Mu.Tha.Er. Ganesh would be the cousin of
Mu,Ko.Ka.Mu.Tha.Ka. Ganesh.

Nowadays, the complete "vilasam" is used only in solemn occasions -- more commonly, only the first initial (father's) is used. As for why we don't use a last name, my guess is that a last name like a caste name is really not identification enough.

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Okay, you know that Uma Thurman's first name is Indian but did you know where it came from? Now that you know all about Indian last names, here is a site where you can find a partly annotated list of Indian first names .

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For more information of caste in India esp. with regard to social mobility, you can read this short write up.

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There is an argument on the other side too. Here's Anandshankar Mazumdar's argument that urban, well-educated Indians who are not from South India have last names.

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Last Modified: Jan 1996

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