Mleccha (Sanskrit: म्लेच्छ, "non-Vedic") is an ancient Indian term for foreigners, used much as the ancient Greeks used barbaros: originally it indicated the incomprehensible speech of foreigners, extended to their unfamiliar and uncouth behaviour, and became a derogatory term in the sense of "impure or inferior" people.
The Indians referred to all alien cultures they considered less civilized in ancient times as mleccha. It was commonly used for "outer barbarians of whatever race or colour", and was also applied by the ancient Indian kingdoms to foreigners—especially Persians. Among other groups termed mleccha were Sakas, Huns, Yavanas, Kambojas, Pahlavas, Bahlikas and Rishikas. The Amarakosha described the Kiratas and Pulindas as the mleccha-jatis. Indo-Greeks, Scythians, were also mlecchas.
The Vayu, Matsya and Brahmanda Puranas state that the seven Himalayan rivers pass through mleccha countries. The Brahmanas place mlecchas outside the varna system. Southworth suggests that the name comes from miḻi- "speak, one's speech", might have been derived from the etymology of the word Tamiḻ. The term Mencha, probably a tadbhava, was also used by the medieval Marathi saint Samarth Ramdas, a Hindu sant, author and Advaita Vedanta philosopher, to refer to the invading Mughals, who were both Muslims and ruled by Mongols.