Many Indians journeyed out of India to supplant the loss of slave labour in the former European plantation colonies of Mauritius, South Africa, Fiji, and the Caribbean from the early nineteenth century onwards. This book aims to highlight the careers of these migrants who served as vital agents in building the global society of the twenty-first century. It explores the transformative experiences of those who migrated, and the memories of those who did not return after expiration of their contracts but chose instead to stay in their respective host countries. It describes the many challenges they faced — ageing in a society far from home, the loss of their formal Indian identity after Indian independence, their efforts to preserve a sense of community in the post-independence societies of South Africa and the Caribbean, and their adapting to the new political and social realities they faced as minorities in the countries in which their ancestors had adventurously determined to settle and live.

‘Girmitiyas and the Global Indian Diaspora takes the reader from India to Natal, Fiji, Trinidad and Surinam. Using new source material such as folklore in the vernacular languages and photographs, the 10 chapters offer bold and fresh perspectives on the transformative experience of Indians who migrated overseas to work on colonial plantations. The focus is on being and the never completed process of becoming. Particularly insightful are the chapters dealing with the recruitment of indentured women, ageing on plantations and migration as resistance to caste oppression. This is an excellent addition to the literature on indenture and migration.’

Nira Wickramasinghe - Leiden University

‘Bringing together leading and emerging voices in the history of indenture today and from across the globe, this crucial volume takes the field towards new concerns around memory, diaspora and identity. At a time when the legacies and after-effects of coerced labour are at the forefront of public and institutional discussions, this is a valuable intervention which foregrounds South Asian labourers and subaltern peoples. It also admirably and innovatively stretches the chronology of the story through decolonisation and to the present, working with the premise that this history continues to live on, needing interrogation and urgent and wide consideration by all of us.’

Sujit Sivasundaram - University of Cambridge

‘This collection of essays provides new and interesting perspectives on the study of indenture in the colonial and post-colonial eras. Untapped archival sources reveal the changing identities of the South Asian labour diaspora globally. The volume details the various difficulties encountered by indentured labourers, including growing older in a foreign society, losing their Indian identity, trying to maintain a sense of belonging in the post-colonial host nations, and adjusting to the new political and social realities and challenges they had encountered as minorities in those nations.’

Brij Maharaj - University of KwaZulu-Natal

‘This refreshingly readable collection of essays offers new insights into the study of indenture and its afterlives, exploring the furthest reaches of the archive and the museum for underutilized sources and excavating evolving identities in the global South Asia labour diaspora.’

Marina Carter - author of Servant, Sirdars and Settlers: Indians in Mauritius, 1834–1874

‘Girmitiyas and the Global Indian Diaspora combines in-depth analysis of the history of indentured migrations from India and the many impacts to societies such as Fiji, South Africa, Surinam and Trinidad. Moving beyond mere quantitative studies of numbers and dusty colonial reports, the assembled essays tackle issues of recruitment, gender, ageing, citizenship, folklore, biography and anti-caste activism in girmitiya spaces across the globe. In doing so, this collection offers numerous insights into one of the most important facets of South Asian contributions to the making of the modern world.’

Neilesh Bose - University of Victoria