“Book review | The forgotten saga of India’s indentured labourers”, First Post, December 17, 2023:
“Some years ago, I went to Mauritius. A friend, who lives in Mauritius, took me to Aapravasi Ghat (Immigration Depot), declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2006. The history of Indian indenture registers in our peripheral vision. But, until I read Bhaswati Mukherjee’s recent book, The Indentured and Their Route: A Relentless Quest for Identity (Rupa, 2023), I hadn’t read any detailed account.
To quote, “Indenture and its painful origin fall in a grey area in our history. It has largely remained shrouded in the shadows… After slavery was abolished, it was virtually erased from our collective memories, until UNESCO and the African states reminded the world of the Slave Route. Their intention was to ensure that the ashes of forgetfulness do not fall on it again. The moment has come to do the same for indenture.”
What is indenture? “It is a formal agreement binding an apprentice to a master or a contract by which a person agrees to work for a set period for a colonial landowner.” Ostensibly, indenture was a form of migration to enable the indentured to lead better lives outside India and unlike slavery, was characterised by free choice of contract…..”
Read the full article at Firstpost.com
