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Beyond Indenture brings together original essays by a mix of experienced and upcoming scholars. They reflect, as far as possible, the viewpoints and voices of indentured Indians who exercised agency, resisted and manipulated the colonial labour system to their advantage, and went on to build new lives for themselves overseas following the expiry of their contracts. Some remigrated to other colonies to earn a better wage and escape from debt and other burdens. Among those who chose to remain, women played a prominent role in the struggle for rights, freedom and opportunities, achieving them in ways which often defied or redefined South Asian customs and traditions. Alongside the migrant labourers, 'passenger Indians' made their way to the sugar, tea and rubber colonies, and became clerks, teachers and shopkeepers. After independence, the Indian communities overseas faced newer problems, not least of which were discrimination and marginalisation. Some were forced to return home. Others built upon the experience of struggles in the colonial era to collectively mobilise. Another theme explored is that of the broad alliances of diasporic Indians and Pakistani and Bangladeshi migrants who have been recently enabled by the internet to connect with each other and to reconnect with the countries from which they originated

Cover -- Half-Title -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of Tables and Figures -- List of Maps -- Preface -- Notes on the Contributors -- 1 Introduction: Community and Identity among South Asians in Diaspora -- 2 'They Cannot Represent Themselves': Threats to Difference and So-called Community Politics in Fiji from 1936 to 1947 -- 3 Nested Identities: Ethnicity, Community and the Nature of Group Conflict in Mauritius -- 4 The Development of Communalism among East African Asians -- 5 Imagining? Ethnic Identity and Indians in South Africa -- 6 Migration, Migrant Communities and Otherness in Twentieth-Century Sinhala Nationalism in Sri Lanka (up to Independence) -- 7 Sojourners and Settlers: South Indians and Communal Identity in Malaysia -- 8 Communitarian Identities and the Private Sphere: A Gender Dialogue amongst Indo-Trinidadians (1845-1917) -- 9 Hyderabadis in Pakistan: Changing Nations1 -- 10 Mohajirs in Pakistan: A Case of Nativisation of Migrants -- 11 Bridging the Gulf: Migration, Modernity and Identity among muslims in Mumbai -- 12 Relationships between Muslims and Hindus in the United States: Mlecchas versus Kafirs? -- Index.

Indien und Pakistan erlangten im August 1947 ihre staatliche Unabhängigkeit, nach fast Jahrzehnten Kampf um eine eigene Nation. Sie bildeten eine Art Präzedenzfall für die Abwicklung europäischer Imperien an anderer Stelle. Die Nationenwerdung war schmerzlich: 10 Millionen Menschen mussten ihre angestammten Siedlungsgebiete verlassen, über eine Million Zivilisten wurde getötet. Einen hohen Preis zahlte die damalige Region Punjab, nun durch eine Grenze geteilt. Die Vereinbarung, das koloniale Indien in zwei getrennte Staaten aufzuteilen, Pakistan mit einer muslimischen Mehrheit und Indien mit einer HinduMehrheit, wird allgemein als das Ergebnis eines Konflikts der politischen Eliten gesehen. Ist diese Erklärung hinreichend? Falls nein, was wären die Konsequenzen für das Heute?

"Communalism" is a term used in India, but invented by colonial rulers in the nineteenth century, to refer to the use and manipulation of religious and/or ethnic differences for "political" ends antithetical to the national (or colonial) interest. It is related to, but very different from, the idea of "community". Arguably, the rise of "communalism" was partly a reaction to the undermining of older, more local communities by rapid economic and social change. During the period of colonial occupation alternative outlets for popular unease and discontent included the Indian nationalist movement, but the division of this movement into Muslim, Hindu, Brahmin, non-Brahmin and other fractions, encouraged by the colonial power for strategic reasons, became a hall-mark of Indian politics and social life in the late colonial period. The secularist consensus established in the early years after Independence for a while promised a new future for India. However, during the past decade, the decline of secularism, the decline of the Congress Party, and the emergence of fundamentalist parties and organisations has made communalism once more a prominent feature of Indian life. Communalism has also spread beyond the subcontinent, the political conflicts within India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka increasingly being found mirrored amongst the substantial communities of Indians and Pakistanis living abroad. For historians the question of how the twentieth century's conception of community and contemporary ideas of communalism came about is one of considerable controversy. However, among contemporary sociologists studying community or "race relations" (as they used to be termed) in the United States, the Caribbean, Africa, the U.K. or Indian Ocean States it is often assumed that the identities of migrant communities are largely brought with them, and that they are based upon primordial and age-old forms of identity and conflict to be found in the Indian subcontinent. To put it simply, the fact that communalism is endemic in the Indian ...

?Communalism? is a term used in India, but invented by colonial rulers in the nineteenth century, to refer to the use and manipulation of religious and/or ethnic differences for ?political? ends antithetical to the national (or colonial) interest. It is related to, but very different from, the idea of ?community?. Arguably, the rise of ?communalism? was partly a reaction to the undermining of older, more local communities by rapid economic and social change. During the period of colonial occupation alternative outlets for popular unease and discontent included the Indian nationalist movement, but the division of this movement into Muslim, Hindu, Brahmin, non-Brahmin and other fractions, encouraged by the colonial power for strategic reasons, became a hall-mark of Indian politics and social life in the late colonial period. The secularist consensus established in the early years after Independence for a while promised a new future for India. However, during the past decade, the decline of secularism, the decline of the Congress Party, and the emergence of fundamentalist parties and organisations has made communalism once more a prominent feature of Indian life. Communalism has also spread beyond the subcontinent, the political conflicts within India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka increasingly being found mirrored amongst the substantial communities of Indians and Pakistanis living abroad. For historians the question of how the twentieth century?s conception of community and contemporary ideas of communalism came about is one of considerable controversy. However, among contemporary sociologists studying community or ?race relations? (as they used to be termed) in the United States, the Caribbean, Africa, the U.K. or Indian Ocean States it is often assumed that the identities of migrant communities are largely brought with them, and that they are based upon primordial and age-old forms of identity and conflict to be found in the Indian subcontinent. To put it simply, the fact that communalism is endemic in the Indian subcontinent today, means that it is considered an ?essential? feature of Indian society, and it?s appearance elsewhere is therefore regarded as unproblematic. The international activities of militant political and religious organisations such as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad or Jammia Islamia are likewise predicated upon this assumption, that the interests and identities of Hindus and Muslims everywhere are essentially the same. When looked at more closely however, and in comparative perspective, it soon becomes apparent that to ?be a Hindu? in Leicester, in England, for example, is very different from ?being a Hindu? in Durban South Africa, and that even within the subcontinent the identities of, for example, Muslims in Bombay, and those in Hyderabad, Lucknow or Bangladesh are very different from one another. This article questions some of the assumptions of fundamentalists and western sociologists. It attempts to explain the divergent historical circumstances that have led to the various outcomes in terms of community relations amongst migrant groups in Asia. The article also examines the origins and consequences of the widely varying identities that have emerged among migrant communities within South Asia, and amongst the many communities of South Asians scattered beyond the subcontinent in the former territories of Britain?s colonial empire.

The problem of regional underdevelopment, particularly in tribal India, has long been recognized and more than one political party has campaigned on this issue. The Indian constitution and state and central government development plans have included special clauses aimed at assisting those groups, the tribals or adivasis, who are most affected by the problem. Reports have been commissioned and investigations conducted, but rarely have these ended in constructive or relevant action. The work of anthropologists over a number of generations since the 1920s has perhaps done most to tell us of the real depth of the problem as it has affected central India. Foremost amongst them was W. V. Grigson, the aboriginal tribes enquiry officer of the government of the Central Provinces and Berar, whose 1944 report stands as the most comprehensive study available of the condition of the tribal peoples of this region at the end of the colonial period.