MEANING & CONTEXT
What does Daya mean?
Dayā is a compassion noun in Sanskrit and Hindi and is used as the first member of names such as Dayaram. Sanskrit literature also personifies Daya as a daughter of Daksha and the mother of Abhaya.
Pronunciation
IAST: dayā
Meaning themes
Spellings in Indian scripts
Devanagari
दया
Letter-by-letter: dayā
Conventional spelling
HISTORICAL VOTER RECORDS
Daya in Indian usage
96,927 historical electoral-roll records, chiefly adults, rather than current baby-name rankings.
Used for both boys and girls in these historical records; the recorded sex does not determine anyone’s identity.
- Recorded as female: 34,124 records (35.2%).
- Recorded as male: 62,803 records (64.8%).
By birth decade
| Birth decade | Records |
|---|---|
| 1930s | 3,130 |
| 1940s | 9,148 |
| 1950s | 16,418 |
| 1960s | 23,375 |
| 1970s | 21,887 |
| 1980s | 15,284 |
| 1990s | 6,919 |
| Other decades | 766 |
By state or territory
| State / territory | Records |
|---|---|
| Uttar Pradesh | 29,581 |
| Haryana | 20,253 |
| Bihar | 12,146 |
| Delhi | 7,397 |
| Madhya Pradesh | 7,083 |
| Rajasthan | 6,352 |
| Himachal Pradesh | 4,699 |
| Uttarakhand | 3,520 |
| Jharkhand | 2,174 |
| Andhra Pradesh | 481 |
| Odisha | 442 |
| Chandigarh | 426 |
| Punjab | 387 |
| Kerala | 355 |
| Gujarat | 306 |
| Assam | 274 |
| Goa | 222 |
| Maharashtra | 210 |
| Karnataka | 204 |
| Tripura | 174 |
| Other states | 241 |
How to read these numbers
Small counts and a second count where needed are withheld for privacy; an omitted value is not zero. Coverage, dates and suppression.
Recorded abroad
Official births registered in 2025, for the exact spelling shown.
| Jurisdiction | Spelling / recorded sex | Births | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| England & Wales | Daya / M | 10 | 2,269 |
| England & Wales | Daya / F | 30 | 1,110 |
ONS and National Records of Scotland; Crown copyright, Open Government Licence v3. Counts follow each office’s publication rules.
Explore related lists
Sources
- Historical Indian voter-record totals, v3 ↗ (opens in a new tab)
Historical usage; CC0 1.0; birth years 1910–2001
- England & Wales 2025 birth statistics: Exact spelling Daya; Table_6, C2312 ↗ (opens in a new tab)
Exact spelling Daya; Table_6, C2312
- England & Wales 2025 birth statistics: Exact spelling Daya; Table_6, C1120 ↗ (opens in a new tab)
Exact spelling Daya; Table_6, C1120
- Monier-Williams, dayā, p. 469,3 ↗ (opens in a new tab)
- Wiktionary: दया ↗ (opens in a new tab)
meaning
Adapted dictionary text: CC BY-SA 4.0.