Labbay

The Labbays (Tamil : லப்பை , Urdu : لبابین ,ﻟﺐ ﺑﮯ, also Labbai, Labbei, Labba, Labbabeen, Lababeen, Lababin, Lababīn, Lebbay, Lebbai, Lubbye, Lubbee, Lubbe, Lubbay; ), are a Tamil Muslim trading community in southern India found throughout the southern Indian states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh. The Labbay are a subgroup within the Tamil Muslim community.

Prior to the arrival of the Portuguese in the sixteenth century, maritime trade across the Indian Ocean was predominantly controlled by Muslim merchants. Throughout the coastal regions and their adjoining hinterlands, well-established Muslim communities had emerged, many of which had become deeply assimilated into local cultural frameworks. These groups descend from both migrants and Islamized indigenous populations. Muslims were present in Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka by at least the thirteenth century, with some traditions and scholarly claims suggesting an earlier presence dating back to the eighth century. In Tamil Nadu, periods of Muslim political dominance further consolidated Islamic influence, as Islam assumed the status of the state religion. These phases involved both increased Muslim migration from other regions of the Indian subcontinent and a likely intensification of conversion to Islam among indigenous populations. Collectively, these historical processes culminated in the formation of a Tamil-speaking Muslim community. In the nineteenth century, British colonial administrators employed the term Labbai as a general designation for Tamil-speaking Muslims, analogous to the use of Mappila for Muslims of the Malabar Coast. This usage appears to have originated among Urdu-speakers and became standardised during the colonial period through census ethnography, which classified Muslim populations using caste-like categories. Although some contemporary Labbais have adopted other languages, such as Urdu, the Labbai ethnonym continues to be widely retained.