French India, formally the (), was a French colony comprising five geographically separated enclaves on the Indian Subcontinent that had initially been factories of the French East India Company. They were de facto incorporated into the Republic of India in 1950 and 1954. The enclaves were , Karikal, Yanaon (Andhra Pradesh) on the Coromandel Coast, Mahé on the Malabar Coast and Chandernagor in Bengal. The French also possessed several ('lodges', tiny subsidiary trading stations) inside other towns, but after 1816, the British denied all French claims to these, which were not reoccupied. By 1950, the total area measured , of which belonged to the territory of . In 1936, the population of the colony totalled 298,851 inhabitants, of which 63% (187,870) lived in the territory of Pondichéry. Background France was the last of the major European maritime powers of the 17th century to enter the East India trade. Six decades after the foundation of the English and Dutch East India companies (in 1600 and 1602 respectively), and at a time when both companies were multiplying factories (trading posts) on the shores of India, the French still did not have a viable trading company or a single permanent establishment in the East. Seeking to explain France's late entrance in the East India trade, historians cite geopolitical circumstances such as the inland position of the French capital, France's numerous internal customs barriers, and parochial perspectives of merchants on France's Atlantic coast, who had little appetite for the large-scale investment required to develop a viable trading enterprise with the distant East Indies. History Initial marine voyages to India (16th century) The first French commercial venture to India is believed to have taken place in the first half of the 16th century, in the reign of King Francis I, when two ships were fitted out by some merchants of Rouen to trade in eastern seas; they sailed from Le Havre and were never heard of again. In 1604, a company was granted letters patent by King Henry IV, but the project failed. Fresh letters patent were issued in 1615, and two ships went to India, only one returning. La Compagnie française des Indes orientales (French East India Company) was formed under the auspices of Cardinal Richelieu (1642) and reconstructed under Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1664), sending an expedition to Madagascar. First factory in India (1668) In 1667, the French India Company sent out another expedition, under