From Pyjamas to Shampoo: Indian Words That Became Everyday English in the UK
- Daniel Holland
- Sep 10, 2025
- 5 min read
Slip into your pyjamas, open the veranda door, and maybe mutter that your neighbour has a “cushy job” — and you’ve just spoken several words borrowed from India. English in the UK is full of Indian-origin words, so familiar we rarely stop to think where they came from.
The most obvious examples are food-related, words like curry, chutney, masala, and poppadom arrived alongside the dishes themselves, becoming staples of British dining thanks to centuries of trade and migration. But beyond the kitchen, there are dozens more words woven into daily speech that reveal the long and complicated ties between Britain and India.
As William Dalrymple once put it, “Empires leave behind not just monuments, but the words we use every day.” And the British Empire in India left more than just railways and red post boxes, it left a permanent mark on the English language.
How the Empire Shaped English
The borrowing of Indian words into English was not an accident. It was the product of empire. From the early 1600s, the East India Company established trading posts in Surat, Calicut, and Madras, bringing British merchants, soldiers, and clerks into daily contact with Indian languages like Hindi, Urdu, Tamil, and Sanskrit.
By the mid-18th century, Britain was the dominant colonial power in India. As officials, soldiers, and their families settled into life on the subcontinent, they borrowed local words for things that English had no word for. Some were practical, like pyjamas for loose, comfortable trousers in the heat, while others described entirely new sights, like the dense jungles or the fast cheetahs.
The words flowed back to Britain through:
Trade – Cotton, spices, dyes, and silks were exported with their names: calico from Calicut, seersucker from Hindi, dungarees from Dongri.
Colonial administration – Officials adopted local terms for housing (bungalow), markets (bazaar), and workers (sepoy).
Military service – Soldiers brought home words from uniforms (khaki), weaponry (lathi), and enemies (thug).
Missionaries and travellers – Writers like Rudyard Kipling popularised words like pukka and veranda in British literature.
Daily life of colonials – British families in India lived with punkahs (fans), ate chutney and mulligatawny soup, and hired local ayahs (nannies). Some of these words stuck back home, while others faded after the Raj ended.
When soldiers returned from campaigns, or civil servants came home on leave, their letters, diaries, and conversations sprinkled with Indian words entered the mainstream. Newspapers reported on “loot” taken in the 1857 Rebellion, novels described life in the “bungalow,” and advertisements for “shampoo” promoted a new kind of hair wash to Victorian households.
By the 19th century, the English spoken in Britain was full of Anglo-Indian terms. As the Victorian historian Thomas Babington Macaulay observed in 1835, “A single shelf of a good European library is worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia.” His arrogant dismissal of Indian culture ignored the truth: the English language itself was already borrowing Indian words on a grand scale.
Clothing and Fabrics
Textiles were among the most important goods traded under empire, and their names travelled too.
Pyjamas – From Hindi/Urdu pae jama (“leg clothing”). Practical in the hot climate, they soon became British nightwear.
Khaki – From Urdu khaki, “dust-coloured.” First worn by British regiments in India, later standard issue.
Shawl – From Hindi shāl, especially Kashmir woollen wraps.
Bandanna – From Hindi bandhna, “to tie.” A dyed, patterned cloth that travelled via trade routes.
Dungarees – From Hindi dungri, cloth from Dongri near Mumbai. First workwear, now fashion.
Cashmere – From Kashmir’s prized wool.
Calico – From Calicut (modern Kozhikode), famed for its cotton.
Seersucker – From Hindi sirsakar, via Persian, for puckered fabric.
Jodhpurs – From Jodhpur, Rajasthan. Riding trousers popular with British officers.
Bangle – From Hindi bangri, meaning bracelet.
Nature and Animals
Empire brought British eyes to India’s flora and fauna, and new words came with them.
Cheetah – From Sanskrit chitraka, “spotted one.” First brought to Britain in menageries.
Banyan – From Gujarati bānyān, a fig tree often associated with merchants who traded beneath them.
Mango – From Tamil māṅgai, introduced to Britain by Portuguese and Indian traders.
Jackal – From Sanskrit śṛgāla.
Jungle – From Hindi jangal, meaning wilderness. Used widely in colonial adventure writing.
Cobra – Adopted during descriptions of Indian wildlife, with Portuguese and Indian roots.
Pukka – From Hindi pakka, meaning authentic or well-made. Became slang for “excellent.”
Sandalwood – Exported for incense and carvings, the name entered English along with the product.
Everyday Life and Work
Many words came through colonial daily life, filtering back into English society.
Shampoo – From Hindi chāmpo, to press or massage. Early 19th-century “shampoo parlours” in London offered exotic head massages before the word shifted to mean hair washing.
Veranda – From Hindi varandā, a shaded porch, copied by colonial architecture.
Bazaar – From Persian via Hindi, describing a bustling marketplace.
Loot – From Hindi lūt, to plunder. Gained notoriety during the 1857 Rebellion when newspapers described “loot” taken from Indian cities.
Cushy – From Hindi/Urdu khush, meaning pleasant. Soldiers in WWI popularised it as slang for “easy.”
Thug – From Hindi thag, referring to the notorious Thuggee cult. British officers’ reports introduced it into English as “criminal.”
Juggernaut – From Sanskrit Jagannātha, meaning “Lord of the World.” British misread the Puri chariot festival as destructive, turning it into a metaphor for unstoppable force.
Bungalow – From Hindi bangla, a Bengal-style house, adopted by British families and later the UK housing market.
Military and Politics
The empire’s bureaucracy and army also left a lasting vocabulary.
Sepoy – From Persian sipāhī, soldier. Common in British accounts of the East India Company’s armies.
Lathi – From Hindi, a stick or staff used by police.
Sahib – From Urdu, “master.” Used as a title for European men in India.
Memsaab – From Hindi/Urdu, combining “ma’am” with sahib. A term for European women in colonial households.
Spirituality and Culture
Long before yoga mats filled gyms in Britain, the empire introduced Indian spiritual terms.
Yoga – From Sanskrit yoga, meaning union or discipline. First studied by colonial scholars before becoming popular worldwide.
Guru – From Sanskrit, a teacher or guide, broadened in English to any expert.
Mantra – From Sanskrit, meaning sacred utterance.
Avatar – From Sanskrit avatāra, incarnation. Modern English borrowed it again in the digital age.
Why These Words Stayed
Not every Anglo-Indian word survived. Terms like ayah (nanny), tiffin (light meal), or punkah (fan) faded as colonial life receded. But the survivors filled real needs in English — there was no other word for bungalow or pyjamas. Soldiers, merchants, and writers kept them alive in Britain, where they eventually lost their “foreign” feel.
Migration and Modern Britain
Post-1947 migration reinforced this vocabulary. Indian, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi communities in Britain not only kept words like chai and masala alive but also ensured that terms like curry became part of Britain’s cultural identity.
As historian Yasmin Khan notes, “What began as colonial borrowing has become shared heritage.”
Conclusion
It’s no surprise that food words are the most obvious Indian borrowings — cuisine was a powerful export. But the real story of Indian words in British English lies in empire: in soldiers’ slang, in traders’ accounts, in administrators’ reports, and in everyday colonial life.
From pyjamas to shampoo, khaki to bungalow, these words aren’t just imports. They’re reminders of how language, like history, carries the traces of empire long after the empire itself is gone.
Sources:
Yule, Henry & Burnell, A. C. Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases. 1903 edition.
Oxford English Dictionary, entries on Indian-origin words.
Dalrymple, William. The Anarchy. Bloomsbury, 2019.
Khan, Yasmin. The Great Partition. Yale University Press, 2007.
BBC Culture: “How India Changed English Forever,” 2018.
