A lakh (; abbreviated L; sometimes written lac) is a unit in the

Indian numbering system The Indian numbering system is used in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh to express large numbers, which differs from the International System of Units. Commonly used quantities include ''lakh'' (one hundred thousand) and ''crore' ...

equal to one hundred thousand (100,000;

scientific notation Scientific notation is a way of expressing numbers that are too large or too small to be conveniently written in decimal form, since to do so would require writing out an inconveniently long string of digits. It may be referred to as scientif ...

: 10⁵). In the Indian 2, 2, 3 convention of digit grouping, it is written as 1,00,000. For example, in India, 150,000

rupees Rupee (, ) is the common name for the currencies of India, Mauritius, Nepal, Pakistan, Seychelles, and Sri Lanka, and of former currencies of Afghanistan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, the United Arab Emirates (as the Gulf rupee), British East Afr ...

becomes 1.5 ''lakh'' rupees, written as 1,50,000 or INR 1,50,000. It is widely used both in official and other contexts in

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

Bangladesh Bangladesh, officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world and among the List of countries and dependencies by ...

Bhutan Bhutan, officially the Kingdom of Bhutan, is a landlocked country in South Asia, in the Eastern Himalayas between China to the north and northwest and India to the south and southeast. With a population of over 727,145 and a territory of , ...

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Myanmar Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and has ...

Nepal Nepal, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mainly situated in the Himalayas, but also includes parts of the Indo-Gangetic Plain. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China Ch ...

Pakistan Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the Islam by country# ...

, and

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

. It is often used in

Bangladeshi Bangladeshis ( ) are the citizens and nationals of Bangladesh, a South Asian country centred on the transnational historical region of Bengal along the Bay of Bengal, eponymous bay. Bangladeshi nationality law, Bangladeshi citizenship was fo ...

, Indian,

Pakistani Pakistanis (, ) are the citizens and nationals of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Pakistan is the fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the second-largest Muslim population as of 2023. As much as ...

, and

Sri Lankan English Sri Lankan English (SLE) is the English language as it is used in Sri Lanka, a term dating from 1972. Sri Lankan English is principally categorised as the Standard Variety and the Nonstandard Variety, which is called as "Not Pot English". The ...

Usage

Indian English Indian English (IndE, IE) or English (India) is a group of English dialects spoken in the Republic of India and among the Indian diaspora and native to India. English is used by the Government of India for communication, and is enshrined ...

, the word is used both as an

attributive In grammar, an attributive expression is a word or phrase within a noun phrase that modifies the head noun. It may be an: * attributive adjective * attributive noun * attributive verb or other part of speech, such as an attributive numeral. ...

and non-attributive noun with either an unmarked or marked ("-s") plural, respectively. For example: "1 ''lakh'' people"; "''lakhs'' of people"; "20 ''lakh''

rupee Rupee (, ) is the common name for the currency, currencies of Indian rupee, India, Mauritian rupee, Mauritius, Nepalese rupee, Nepal, Pakistani rupee, Pakistan, Seychellois rupee, Seychelles, and Sri Lankan rupee, Sri Lanka, and of former cu ...

s"; "''lakhs'' of rupees". In the abbreviated form, usage such as "5L" or "5 lac" (for "5 ''lakh'' rupees") is common. In this system of numeration, 100 ''lakh'' is called one ''

crore Crore (; abbreviated cr) denotes the quantity ten million (107) and is equal to 100 lakh in the Indian numbering system. In many international contexts, the decimal quantity is formatted as 10,000,000, but when used in the context of the India ...

'' and is equal to 10 million. Formal written publications in English in India tend to use lakh/

for Indian currency and Western numbering for foreign currencies, such as dollars and pounds.

Silver market

The term is also used in the pricing of silver on the international

precious metal Precious metals are rare, naturally occurring metallic chemical elements of high Value (economics), economic value. Precious metals, particularly the noble metals, are more corrosion resistant and less reactivity (chemistry), chemically reac ...

s market, where one ''lakh'' equals of

silver Silver is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. ...

Etymology and regional variants

The modern word ''lakh'' derives from , originally denoting "mark, target, stake in gambling", but also used as the numeral for "100,000" in Gupta-era Classical Sanskrit (''

Yājñavalkya Smṛti The ''Yajnavalkya Smriti'' (, IAST: ') is one of the many Dharma-related texts of Hinduism composed in Sanskrit. It is dated between the 3rd and 5th century CE, and belongs to the Dharmashastra tradition. The text was composed after the Manusmr ...

'', ''

Harivaṃśa The ''Harivamsa'' (, ) is an important work of Sanskrit literature, containing 16,374 shlokas, mostly in the ''anustubh'' Metre (poetry), metre. The text is also known as the ''Harivamsa Purana.'' This text is believed to be a ''khila'' (ap ...

''). ; By language * Assamese: ''lokhyo'', or ''lakh'' * Bengali: natively (

tadbhava (Sanskrit: तद्भव, , lit. "arising from that") is the Sanskrit word for one of three etymological classes defined by native grammarians of Middle Indo-Aryan languages, alongside tatsama and deśi words. at pp. 67-69. A "tadbhava" is ...

) known as ''lākh'', though some use the ardha-tatsama ''lokkho''. *

Bhojpuri Bhojpuri may refer to: * Bhojpuri language, an Indo-Aryan language of India and Nepal * Bhojpuri grammar, grammatical rules of the language * Bhojpuri nouns, nouns of the language * Bhojpuri people, people who speak the language * Bhojpuri region ...

: 𑂪𑂰𑂎 ''lākh'' *

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

: ''lākh'' * Dhivehi: ''lakka'' * Gujarati: ''lākh'' *

Kannada Kannada () is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly in the state of Karnataka in southwestern India, and spoken by a minority of the population in all neighbouring states. It has 44 million native speakers, and is additionally a ...

: ''lakṣha'' * Kashmiri: ''lachh'' * Khasi: *

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian languages, Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (union territory), Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of ...

: ''laksham'' *

Marathi Marathi may refer to: *Marathi people, an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group of Maharashtra, India **Marathi people (Uttar Pradesh), the Marathi people in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh *Marathi language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Mar ...

: ''lākh/laksha'' * Meitei: ꯂꯥꯛ ''lāk'' * Nepali: ''lākh'' * Odia: ''låkhyå'' * Punjabi: (

Shahmukhi Shahmukhi (, , , ) is the right-to-left abjad-based script developed from the Perso-Arabic alphabet used for the Punjabi language varieties, predominantly in Punjab, Pakistan. It is generally written in the Nastaʿlīq calligraphic hand, whic ...

: ,

Gurmukhi Gurmukhī ( , Shahmukhi: ) is an abugida developed from the Laṇḍā scripts, standardized and used by the second Sikh guru, Guru Angad (1504–1552). Commonly regarded as a Sikh script, Gurmukhi is used in Punjab, India as the official scrip ...

: ) ''lakkh'' * Sinhala: *

Tamil Tamil may refer to: People, culture and language * Tamils, an ethno-linguistic group native to India, Sri Lanka, and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka ** Myanmar or Burmese Tamils, Tamil people of Ind ...

: ''latcham'' * Telugu: ''laksha'' *

Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...

: ''lākh''

References

External links

* {{Cite web, last=IINRG, first=Ranchi, title=Government Organisation, url=http://ilri.ernet.in/, access-date=22 February 2020, archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180929175743/http://ilri.ernet.in/, archive-date=29 September 2018, url-status=dead Powers of ten Units of amount Hindi words and phrases Urdu-language words and phrases Indian English idioms Pakistani English idioms Bengali words and phrases Customary units in India Nepali words and phrases

Usage

Silver market

Etymology and regional variants

See also

References

External links