although millions of people in india, pakistan, bangladesh, and nepal claim hashemite descent (genealogy family trees 'shajra' are looked into in identification of the authenticity of the claim to hashemite descent). in 1901 the total number of sayyids in british india was counted as 1,339,734. recent estimates show that in india, pakistan, bangladesh, and nepal there are more than fifteen million sayyids: eight million in pakistan, seven million in india, over one million in bangladesh, and around seventy thousand in nepal.