In the 1960s, I travelled through British ex-colonies of Asia and Africa. A decade later, I had the chance to visit the Caribbean, USA and islands of South Pacific. In most places I met Indians, mostly old settlers but some were new arrivals too.

Both groups were meek docile but industrial people. I am talking about the time when Indians in large were allowed to enter England as blue coloured workers. In London and other big cities they were engaged in construction work. But some were engaged in essential services such as the railways, post and telegraph offices and brick laying work.

Their women folk then or those among them needed extra income to meet the expenses of schooling their kids, found odd jobs in shops and factories. Very often, I found them sweeping floors at Heathrow Airport.

I found new arrivals also in East Africa. They were hard working young men mostly from Patel and affiliated castes. The predominance of Patel businessmen was so well-marked that indigenous Africans in Nairobi or Dar-as-Salaam would often inquire 'Bawna, are you a Patel or 'dukkawal' - that is a shop owner'?

For a year or two, the new arrivals worked at the shop of an old relative or acquaintance until he became fully familiar with intricacies of an African market, viz; gaudy colours, cheap but attractive bracelets, pocket-size radios and bicycles etc. They usually cheated their African customers by rocketing price of goods on demand.

The African hardly bargained. Haggling was not their usual habit. Besides, like children, they always became so excited to grab a fancy thing that they usually handed over all the money into the shopkeeper's hand.

The worth of coins such as Pound or Shillings was not important to the Africans. The Indian attitude on the other hand was very different. They had gone to Africa to earn money; first to make a living, second to grow rich and influential.

Nothing else mattered to them least of all education. Hence, every evening Indian family, the parents - both husband and wife - and their children sit on the floor and count the money, the earnings they earned during the day.

Between them and Africans there was hardly any contact beyond the market place. This was one reason why Indians remained isolated in alien lands.

The situation was however very different in the case South African Indians. They migrated to South Africa between 1840 and 1900 - after which migration was generally discouraged.

Harsher racist laws and racial segregation made it difficult for Indians to maintain regular contact with their country of origin. Of course, Contract Laws provide for passage money to a labourer who completed his five years contract period, but few freed Indians ever returned to India barring, perhaps a handful, who Simply to breathe his/her last in their ancestral home.

This duality in Indian character is so very well-marked that few can afford to overlook it.

In 1973, the Maltese Government set up a transit camp to shelter fleeing Indian families from Uganda as a result of Idi Amin's threat. The camp commandant was an Englishman who argued with Indians to return to India instead of waiting indefinitely in transit camps for entry permit to UK.

The commandant requested me to advice and assist. To my surprise the Camp people refused even to listen to me. 'Why return to India and starve there?', one asked and another explained 'India too is poor country, and there is too many competition in our type of business. How can we survive there?'

Their answers gave me food for thought. They had genuine fear about their future but they helped to spread bad impressions about India.

Frankly, much of the misrepresentation of India I heard in Africa originated from such loose talks Indians themselves made both at home and in their working places. The habit, alas, still runs strong.

Part II - Sugar colonies and Islands
Part III - Indians Abroad - Diaspora