Danish India is the name given to the colonies of Denmark (Denmark–Norway before 1813) in India, forming part of the Danish colonial empire.
Denmark-Norway holds colonial possessions in India for more than two hundred years, including the town of Tharangambadi in present-day Tamil Nadu state, Serampore in present-day West Bengal, and the Nicobar Islands, currently part of India's union territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
The Danish presence in India is of little significance to the major European powers as they present neither a military nor a mercantile threat.
Dano-Norwegian ventures in India, as elsewhere, are typically undercapitalized and never able to dominate or monopolize trade routes in the same way that the companies of Portugal, the Netherlands and Britain can.
Against all odds, however, they manage to cling to their colonial holdings, and at times, to carve out a valuable niche in international trade by taking advantage of wars between larger countries and offering foreign trade under a neutral flag.
For this reason their presence is tolerated until 1845, when their alliance with a defeated France leads to the colony being ceded to the British East India Company.
