________________
SCHOOL
TIONAL
OF
HAIN STUDIES
SELF STUDY IS THE SUPREME AUSTERITY,
वाध्याय परम
India, a small percentage (12.1%) are self-employed in the United States (Williams 1988:
64). By 1990s the population of Jainas in the U.S. had increased to about 50,000 and presently it is estimated at 100,000. Most Jainas in the U.S. live in nine states. These are (in order of population density) New York, California, New Jersey, Michigan, Texas, Illinois, Ohio, Maryland and Massachusetts.
By the mid-1990s there were 55 Jaina socio-cultural associations/societies/centers in the U.S. catering to a wide variety of community needs. Today their number has gone well over 110. To further co-ordinate the activities of these associations the Federation of Jain Associations in North America was formed in 1981 "which had more than 6,000 participants in their ninth biannual convention in 1997" (Shah 1998: 82).
4.5
Canada
In the case of Canada it is difficult to say who migrated first to Canada and when. In all probability the first Jainas must have migrated to Canada after India's independence, particularly from the 1950s onwards. Since then a large number of Jainas have migrated to Canada first under the Quota system and subsequently under the Point system. These were joined by a small number of East African Jaina refugees who were expelled from Uganda by Idi Amin Dada in 1972. In the early 1990s the Jaina population of Canada was estimated at about 10,000 (Kumar 1996). According to the same source all Canadian provinces except Saskatchewan, Prince Edward Island, Yukon and North West Territories, had Jain residents. Ontario was the host to the majority of Jains followed by Quebec and British Columbia. This trend of geographical distribution still holds good. As in the U.S., in Canada too a majority of Jains reside in urban and industrial centers and happen to be professionals.
Tables - Statistics & References
Table 1: Variations in the number of Jains since 1891
Census
1881
1891
1901
1911
1921
Page 148 of 317
Number of Jains (in
000s)
1,222
1,417
1,334
1,248
1,177
Percentage of total
population
0.49
0.51
0.47
0.41
0.39
STUDY NOTES version 5.0
Decadal percent change
in the number of Jains
15.94
-5.83
-6.47
-5.26
