Paper short abstract:

Exploration of how Jews and non-Jews are portrayed in each other's fiction in India. While it is hard for the Jewish fiction to escape non-Jewish characters, it is surprising to find Jewish characters in the non-Jewish fiction, given the insignificant numbers of Jews in India.

Paper long abstract:

The paper explores how Jews and non-Jews are portrayed in each other's fiction in India in its various languages. It is probably hard for Jewish writers in India to not have non-Jewish characters in any work of theirs even if it is focused on the Jewish life in India, for the Jews in India are miniscule in numbers and surrounded by a huge sea of non-Jewish population. On the other hand the fact that Jews figure as characters in some works of non-Jewish fiction of India is itself surprising for most of the Indians never come into any direct contact with Jews because of their small numbers. Their perceptions of Jews are largely based on what they come to know about them through secondary sources, mostly unreliable. It is also interesting considering the fact that most of the Indians are ignorant of Jews and tend to mix them up with Zoroastrians (another tiny religious community in India but much larger in numbers than the Jews there) and sometimes even with Christians and Muslims. This is in spite of a continuous Jewish presence in India for possibly two millennia and at least twelve centuries.

Curiosity in the depiction of non-Jews in India's Jewish fiction arises as a result of the fact that anti-Semitism has been unknown in India, making the Jewish experience in India different from their experience anywhere else in the world.