By country · Africa
Between 1896 and 1903, nearly 32,000 Indians — mostly Punjabi Sikhs — built the 600-mile 'Lunatic Line' from Mombasa to Lake Victoria. Some 2,493 died; 6,724 stayed to found East Africa's Indian community. The forgotten origin story of a diaspora.
Scholars from India, Mauritius and the Netherlands convene online, 10–12 September 2026, for an international symposium on India's indentured migration — under a banner they call 'Girmitiyalogy: Text, Theory and Literature.' What the field is, and how to attend.
A new Hindi travelogue by the noted writer Devendra Choubey — ‘Yah, Vah Desh To Nahin: Mauritius, a social journey’ (Aadhar Prakashan, 2026) — reads the island not through its temples and festivals but through the freedom struggle of its African slaves and Indian indentured labourers. A book note, in English and Hindi.
Bhojpuri crossed the ocean with Mauritius's indentured labourers and became the island's Indian lingua franca. Two centuries later, it is fading — and being fought for.
Part 1 of Children of the Girmit. Nearly 700,000 indentured Indians passed through a single stone depot in Port Louis — and their descendants became the majority, and the rulers, of an Indian Ocean nation.
External Affairs Minister Jaishankar signed an archival cooperation agreement with Trinidad and Tobago to help members of the Indo-Caribbean diaspora trace their ancestral roots. The Government of India is creating a comprehensive global Girmitiya database.
The Government of India has extended Overseas Citizen of India eligibility to the sixth generation of Indian-origin diaspora in Trinidad and Tobago — recognising the descendants of indentured Girmitiya labourers who arrived in 1845. A historic outreach with implications for other long-tail diaspora communities.
An OCI pays Indian tax on Indian-source income — rent, interest, capital gains — under residency rules that tightened again on 1 April 2026. The TDS regime, DTAA relief, TCS on outbound money, and the traps, explained.
