Mystery of Roma Gypsies cracked, their ancestors were Indian Dalits

Mystery of Roma Gypsies cracked, their ancestors were Indian Dalits

Mangalore Today/ ITV

New Delhi, Dec 2: A team of international scientists led by Dr Kumarasamy Thangaraj of the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, has concluded that the aboriginal scheduled tribe and scheduled caste population of north-western India, traditionally referred to as Doma and also Dalits, are the most likely ancestors of the Roma Gypsies of Europe, The Tribune reported.

 

The Gypsies of Europe or Romani people have an Indian genetic connection, says the study. The team conducted what is claimed to be the first ever scientific study of the origin and genetic history of Roma population.

 

“We have been able to crack the mystery surrounding the origin and migration of the Roma population. The ancestors of this wandering tribe could have migrated from India about 1,400 years ago,” Dr Thangaraj said.

The study analysed the Y chromosome samples of over 10,000 men to establish the genetic signature of ancestor Indians among the Gypsy population.

The origin and migration of the Roma across the world has been a mystery so far.

Though the linguistic and genetic studies of European Roma have traced their origin to Eurasia, the exact parental population group and time of dispersal has remained an unsolved puzzle.

 

 

Dr Thangaraj’s team traced the founder of the European Roma using the Y chromosome genetic signatures.
There is no archaeological evidence about the origin of the Roma, and even historical documentation is scanty.

The research therefore focused on genetics.

The conclusions have been arrived at after an exhaustive study involving screening of about 10,000 males around the world, including 7,000 hailing from 205 ethnic population of India to discern a more precise ancestral source of Romani population.

 

Dr Thangaraj said that all males of a family or a population evolved from a single founder make and would possess the same Y chromosome.
Based on the genetic signature that exists on the Y chromosome, every male could be assigned to a specific group (haplogroup), enabling tracing of parental lineage using these signatures.

It was shown that the European Roma possessed the Y chromosome haplogroup Hlala.

The most recent common ancestor of European Roma was not identified because of the absence of similar data from their putative homeland, India.

“We have compared the worldwide phylogeographical (study of the historical processes that may be responsible for the contemporary geographic distributions of individuals) data for Indian Hlala haplotypes with Roma and concluded that Doma are most likely ancestral populations,” the scientist said.