Purnima Mehta Bhatt, The African Diaspora in India: Assimilation, Change and Cultural Survivals, 1st Edition, Routledge, New York, 2017

Indo-African relations in the last ten years have been considerably enhanced through the lines of credit that the former has extended to the latter in various fields such as agriculture, health, infrastructure, and others. Therefore, these have received attention in academic writings. However, the focus on the African diaspora in India has been quite limited in comparison to the African students who visit India as part of the diplomatic relations.   The Sidis are among one such diaspora community in India, who have come from Africa and are now settled in the Indian states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, and Goa. This has been further discussed in the book “The African Diaspora in India,” by Purnima M. Bhatt. This book is in fact the first of its kinds to focus on the Sidis in India and the author through a total of twelve chapters, takes the readers through a holistic read stating the history of Sidis in India to the manner in which the community has assimilated into the Indian society and lastly brings to show the social, economic and political status of the Sidis today.

Bhatt in the first chapter opens the discussion on the historical connection between the Sidis and the Indian subcontinent. She highlights the places that are inhabited by the Sidis in India, i.e. the western coast of India which comprises the state of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Goa and Andhra Pradesh. She also introduces the readers to the terminology by which this community was referred to in India, i.e. by the term Habshi or Sidis. The term Habshi is used in Arabic and Persian dictionary for those belonging to Abyssinia or Ethiopia, while Sidi comes from the word sidi and refers to the learned. The author further explores how this community entered India as slaves, mercenaries and sailors who later went ahead to attain high positions of power at Indian courts during the medieval time which helped gain high status in the Indian society. This rise in the status proves that the Sidis’ positions as slaves never really limited them to attain mobility in the Indian society. This chapter has also emphasised the physical appearances of this community, i.e. their ancestry can be traced back to the African ethnic groups residing on the continent of Africa. They have dark skin ranging from black to light brown with wool-like hair, thick lips, a flattened nose and a heavy build. There is also an account of the languages of the community; Bhatt states the original language of the Sidis was derived from Swahili, Somali, Sudanese family languages. However, the language used by the Sidis was influenced by the region of India they settled into. For example, Sidis residing in the coastal areas of Kutch and Northern Saurashtra mostly speak Kutch languages whereas Sidis in Saurashtra speak Kathiawadi (Saurashtrian) dialects of Gujarat.

In the next chapter, the author moves on to look at the discussions on the links between India and Africa. She particularly focuses on the coastal trade between East Africa and the west coast of India, the evidence of which can be seen through the terracotta models of ships. Talking of the trade links, it was also evidenced through the archaeological findings in Egypt that boats were being used to travel since 4000-3000 BCE attesting that there was a history of trade between Egypt, India and West Asia. This evidence of the trade history can also be found in Mahabharata, Ramayana and Rig Veda. These facts further reinforce the point that Africans and West coast Indians have been historically involved in these trades.

In the following chapter, the author looks into the institution of slavery connected to the Sidis in India. India has had a history of slavery, which can be evidenced in the Rig Veda. This slavery relates back to how indigenous people of Indus Valley were defeated and enslaved by the Aryans and Europeans. However, slavery in the context of India was different from the one in the new world because the former looked at treating slaves as an extension of families, which was not the case in terms of the latter. In the third chapter, the author provides a brief on the Indian Ocean slave trade and how the practice of slavery was connected to it. This trade pre-dates   the Atlantic slave trade with a time period of about 1000 years. It is also claimed by the author that this trade happened to be the first trade between the east coast of Africa and western India, but it has not received a substantial amount of attention in comparison to the Atlantic slave trade. The evidence of the Indian slave trade was seen in the official documents of the Bombay Presidency, which provided useful information on the importation of slaves into western India from countries of East Africa such as Mozambique and Zanzibar. The slaves from the East African countries were also brought to India by the Portuguese rulers, who happened to establish their colonies in Africa as well. They (slaves) were brought to the Indian States of Goa, Daman and Diu. In Daman, they were used locally and in Diu, they were often utilised as domestic labour. 

In the fourth chapter, the author introduces the readers to how the East African slave trade was documented in the travel literature or accounts. It was documented in the travel accounts of N.Conti, who was a European traveller in India, that the wealth which existed within the state of Gujarat, was brought through the trade with the regions of Red Sea, Persian Gulf, the East African coast and Southeast Asia. In addition to this, there have also been official Indian records from the 13th century that state that Ethiopian soldiers like Jamal-ud-din bin Yakut lived  during this period. However, while such positions were given to Africans, they were still considered to be slaves in the general context of the society.

In the fifth chapter, the author tries to take the readers into the history of Sidis in South Asia. She begins the discussion with how Gujarat became a hotspot for the Sidis due to its geographical location, which supported the trade between the Swahili coast and west coast of India. This is also the reason why the Africans got closer access to the political positions within the Nizam Shahi dynasty of Ahmadnagar in the Deccan. The author also provides evidence for the presence of the Sidi community in Oudh (present-day Lucknow). This can be seen through the existence of the African slaves as bodyguards in the Oudh royal family.  According to the historian Ferishta, the African slaves were also reported to be found in the state of Bengal under the ruler Ruknuddin Barbak Shah in which the former was promoted to a high rank. Finally, other than the west coast of India, the prevalence of the Sidis was also found in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Maldives.

In the following chapter, the author discusses the three kingdoms in India where the social mobility of the Sidis could be observed i.e. Janjira, Sachin, and Jaunpur, which survived until the middle of the 20th century. Janjira is located in the Konkan region of Maharashtra, and the role of the Sidis in the kingdom was that of soldiers and mercenaries. Janjira was closely connected to the Kingdom of Sachin. The latter was a kingdom located in the current state of Gujarat, which consisted of twenty villages and was close to the sea and controlled by the Sidis. They also dominated the royal kingdoms of North India, such as Jaunpur, which was an important provincial capital of the Tughlaq Empire. Noting how slavery impacted the Sidi community, the author also explains how slavery came to an end, with its traces continuing to be present in India. 

The author also takes us through the journey of acculturation of the Sidis in India that has taken place through their involvement in the religious heritage of India among other ways. For example, their migration into Karnataka determined their religion to be Hindus, those in Portuguese regions were Christians and the majority of them were also influenced by Sufism in Gujarat. However, this Sufi practice differed from the ways it was practised in their homeland in Africa because the former comprises spirit possession, the local practices including the use of amulets, talismans and charms to ward off evil (ta’wiz). Another unique tradition of Sufism that the Sidis followed was the Dargah form of worship instead of Mosque-centred worship, due to their roots in the beliefs and practices of ancient Egyptian civilization and the worship of the departed souls. Lastly, the entity that encompasses the religious life of the Sidis is their sacred dance, the Dhamal. It includes fast movements and bodily vibrations, dramatic facial expressions accompanied by chants and songs to praise Allah and Baba Ghor. This represents the ecstatic and rhythmic dance traditions of the African continent with Sufi mystical elements.

In the eighth chapter of this book on the Sidis, Bhatt explores how this community has contributed to architecture and art in India. The author identifies the presence of Africans in 18th and 19th century Indian architecture and art. However, she also points out that identifying the Sidis in the paintings by the scholars was difficult. Nevertheless, historians have been successful in this to a great extent. To provide evidence for this, Bhatt tries to bring in the example of  Sidi Saiyyed Mosque built by Shaykh Sayyid al-Habshi Sultani, a Habshi nobleman during the reign of Sultan  Muzaffar III (1572–1573). He was originally a slave of Rumi Khan who later joined the service of Sultan Mahmud II (Commissariat 1938:502). Upon the death of his patron, he joined the service of Jhujhar Khan. It is believed that on his retirement he received several villages in gifts and amassed great wealth. In terms of art, there have been records since the sixteenth century and to be precise from the times of the Mughal Empire wherein descendants of Africans are portrayed quite vividly in the court of rulers such as Akbar as musicians, personal bodyguards, hukkah bearers and bearers of flywhisks.

In the following chapter, the author provides evidence of how slavery was abolished by the British in 1843 and how the African slaves were not allowed to be transported to India via the Indian Ocean. However, although there was the abolition of the slave trade, slavery still continued to exist in India among the princely states of Western India. Bhatt describes how Arab rulers in India attempted to transport the African slaves to the Persian Gulf and how the British Government emancipated the latter and sent them to Aden, Bombay and Seychelles Island. However, although they were rescued by the British Government they did not receive sufficient funds and institutions such as shelters, missions, homes and hostels.

Bhatt further introduces the status of African or Sidi women in India.  She focuses on how African women were missing from the records of arts and architecture that exist today on the African men, but who played a significant role in Indian history. The initial arrival of these women in India is during the Indian Ocean slave trade as domestic workers or sex workers. The author traces areas in which Sidis women were seen to have participated more actively than their men counterparts in society, such as in religious participation, marriage customs, childbearing and practice of divorce. In terms of religious practices, women were seen to be more religiously active in comparison to their male counterparts and the former also played a leading role in the performance of dance and sacrifices towards Mai Mishra, the goddess responsible for fertility amongst the Sidis. The author further explores how the marriage practices took place for the Sidis women, i.e. the marriages were aimed to be endogamous in nature to maintain the purity of the blood and the intermarriage between Habshi and Indians only took place amongst the lower class of people.

In the second last chapter of the book, the author considers looking at the African diasporic community in Asia and India. She opens the discussion by discussing how the displacement of Africans in Asia is different from that in the New World because with the latter they did not share a common language, religion or ethnicity. The Africans who came to India, she emphasizes, were in the Persian Gulf and were then transported to India and these multiple displacements and resettlement were termed as ‘circulatoriness’. The author mentions that the Sidis as a diaspora community stood out to be unique from the others in the world because they always overlooked their history of slavery and proclaimed their past in terms of how they practised intermarriages with the Indian princely families and gained positions of power. In terms of identity formation, they developed it at multiple levels in India. For example, they were the first Gujarati, Indians, Muslims and Scheduled tribes.

In the last chapter of the book, the author introduces the readers to the current status of the Sidis in India. She looks into the social problem that although they have been assimilated into the Indian landscape by the time of India’s independence, they continue to face poverty, lack of education and high rates of unemployment or underemployment. The Sidis also launched a protracted campaign for their inclusion as “scheduled tribes” in 1986. The author also provides state-wise nature of work of the community, i.e. in Gujarat, they are mostly involved in unskilled or semi-skilled jobs; in Maharashtra and particularly in Mumbai, they operate African cafés and restaurants; and in Telegana state, they are massively involved in the practice of Islam and in particular, Sufism. This chapter concludes with the recommendation that education is the way to the development of this community and reduction of poverty.

To conclude, readers can say that this book written and formulated by P.M. Bhatt speaks volumes about factors that have impacted the Sidi community before their arrival in India and also looks into how their life has changed under the cultural, social and also political influences since the time of India’s independence to the current day. However, in the process of formulating the book, there could have been the incorporation of how the experience of the Sidi community can be compared to the Indian diaspora in Africa, particularly in countries such as Kenya and Mauritius. All in all, this is a great book for readers interested in Indo- African diaspora communities and learning how the diplomatic relations between the two impact the lives of the diaspora communities.

Pooja Priya is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Sociology, School of Liberal Education, Galgotias University.