Sindhworkies:The Sindhi merchantile Diaspora:A unique trade culture resulting in Today\'s NRI

IRJMST

Vol 7 Issue 8 [Year 2016]

ISSN 2250 – 1959 (0nline) 2348 – 9367 (Print)

Sindhworkies:The Sindhi merchantile Diaspora:A unique trade culture resulting in Today's NRI Sunil khatri. M.Sc,M.Phil(Chemistry). Dip. In School Management.

Dr. Ravindra Bhardwaj Professor and Head History Department

M.B.A.

Madhav Arts And Commerce College

M.A(History)

Ujjain(M.P)-456010

Research scholar

INTRODUCTION::: Every civilized society always loves its history and we ,specially being Indians, always find our self elevated while talking about our fantabulous past as our great civilization is one among the oldest and richest civilizations of the world. Any civilization can command respect from the rest of the world only on the basis of its sustained perfection level in each and every sphere of life. One among the most important sphere is Trade and Business; the only sphere I am trying to discuss in this paper. Since Undivided India was geographically very vast, so I am again confining myself on trade of Sindh, that time part of glorious Undivided India. We all are very much aware of the great trading tradition of the Indus Valley civilization, inside as well as outside the society with contemporary Mesopotamia, Egypt and other societies. The glory of "Sapt-Sendhev" region of Vedic age, present day Sindh of Undivided India, for trade and business with Central Asia, Iran, Iraq, Arab, Egypt etc. is very much known. The importance of Sindh, river Sindhu (Indus) can easily be understood by acknowledging the fact that in Rig-Veda, Sindhu river is mentioned numerous times while Ganga only a few. Sindh continued its importance as economical entry point in India even during Mauryan period. Trade was flourishing in Sindh during golden Gupta epoch also. For millennia there has been a regular movement of people and commodities between India and the lands to the 1 north and west and Sindh continuously remained most important center of this trade. Advent of Islam changed the social, economic and cultural pattern of society in whole of the central and the South Asia also. These changes initially gave a jolt to the flourishing trade of Sindh and they restricted themselves mainly to internal trade only. Then from 11th century after the Ghaznavid invasion of India, drastic raise can be seen in the trade and commerce of Sindh and this went on for almost 7 centuries. Throughout this period Sindh functioned as North2 Western India's premier commercial center for international trade. Sindhis were so great in trade and commerce that while doing great amount of trade; they established themselves so strongly that under the Muslim rule of Mirs, Hindu Sindhis, who were only 25% of the total population, had control over 75% of economy!!! Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkhar, Shikarpur, were main cities of sindh and all were under control of Sindhis for practically all reasons. Hindu Sindhis even being in minority were privileged enough by Muslim International Research Journal of Management Science & Technology http://www.irjmst.com

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IRJMST

Vol 7 Issue 8 [Year 2016]

ISSN 2250 – 1959 (0nline) 2348 – 9367 (Print)

rulers and masses only due to their trade and skills. Sindhi diaspora::: By the middle of 16th century, a new concept of business started among Sindhis. They adopted sea route business as it was more profitable to them. Since ships movements depended on wind directions so they use to go out of Sindh with domestic commodities in March towards Central Asia and Europe and returned in the month of October to Sindh along with imported commodities and profit money in the form of gold. They use to keep two permanent houses, one at Sindh and other one at the place of business. By the end of 16th century there were large number of colonies of Sindhi merchants established in number of locations in Central Asia and Iran. This was the beginning of Sindhi merchant diaspora. The term "Diaspora" has been more frequently used to characterize people existing away from their homeland. Etymology of this word can be traced to the Greek 'Diaspora 'combination of 'dia': over and 'speiro': to sow. This term was firstly used in 3ed century BC by Greek speaking Jews in their exile from the holy land. In my present paper the term "diaspora" implies that the Sindhi community maintained identification with their homeland, which earlier was Sindh of undivided India and presently in India, an internal cohesiveness as exclusive community. Multiple historical processes may motivate groups of people to leave their homelands and form a diaspora and factors behind this might be social, economic or political. The political cause, partition of India, created 'Victim diaspora'. The economic cause involves individuals to pursue lucrative commercial endeavors and then attract other individuals also for similarly profitable locations and ultimately form what has come to be known as a merchant diaspora. Merchant diaspora tend to differ from other types of diaspora in terms of higher degree of mobility, a greater amount of communication between the communities, a higher degree of interaction with the indigenous population and majorly it is gender specific (generally male). At initial level the main centers of these in Sindh were Bakkhar, Sakkhar and Rohidi. Earliest entrepreneurs were almost all from Khatri, Bhatia and Lohanas. These are the sub-castes of Sindhi even today also. These Sindhis were equally competed by Multanis in initial phase but later on Sindhis established their monopoly on the international trading. I am discussing only few countries here as below:3

Iran::: Initially we find Sindhi diasporas in Iran under the Safavid rulers. The Russian merchant Kotov in 1620's mentioned that Sindhi and Multani merchants lived and traded in city Isfahan. Some of them were Muslims but majority was of other sect who worshipped sun. 4 According to Englishman John Fryer, Jews, Armenians and Sindhis resided in all the cities of 5 Persia. Ibn batuta also refers to presence of Sindhis in the port of Hurmuz in 14th century. All of them traded in textiles and their control on that trade was so strong that they were known as "bazzaze", the Persian term for cloth merchant. Their important aspect of economic function was that of money lending. They also dealt in money changing. Foreign merchants wanting to buy local goods had to convert their gold Ducats into silver Mahmudis and Sindhis made profit by 6 giving low rate for Ducats bought but while selling Ducats they asked for much higher rates. From late 17th century and early 18th century, the political situation in Iran began to worsen and Sindhis went through a great deal of hardship in this period. Many of them left Iran 7 for India and other places. Few Sindhis migrated to Russia. Till the early years of 1800, few International Research Journal of Management Science & Technology http://www.irjmst.com

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IRJMST

Vol 7 Issue 8 [Year 2016]

ISSN 2250 – 1959 (0nline) 2348 – 9367 (Print)

merchants remained there but their presence was not substantial and they were petty traders only. Central Asia::: Indians were prominent visitors to Samarkand in the 14th 8 century and Multani and Sindhis were leading among them. By the 16th century Sindhi merchants had started settling down and owning property in Bukhara, Tashkent and Samarkand . During the reign of Imam Quli Khan (1611-1641), Hindu traders occupied an entire sub division of the city of 9 Bukhara. They were not restricted only to towns but as per a visitor Josiah Harlan "wherever there is a bazaar Hindus are a necessary part of the establishment". Sindhis were engaged in a variety of economic activities like money lending, wholesale and retail trade, long distance commerce. Caste oriented family firms sent their agents to Turan with textile, sale of which provided capital for investing in money lending. Indians, more specifically Multanis and Shikarpuris, were the only merchant community in Central Asia that issued "Hundis" for transfer of money and travelers often used these to avoid carrying cash on roads, although they had to pay heavy commission for 10 the facility. Afghanistan::: Since Kabul was the focal point of the trade with Central Asia, so 11 around mid 17th century, Thevenot noted that a large Hindu community resided in Kabul. A large number were residing in towns where they were engaged in trade, brokerage, banking etc. Unlike the case of Iran and Central Asia where they lived by themselves, those living in Kabul 12 had brought their families along. In above discussion, we get reference of word "Multanis" up to early 18th century in most of the places and later we get reference of "Shikarpuris". Markovits has suggested that there existed two separate networks, one centered in Multan and other based in Shikarpur (upper Sindh). The latter became more important around the middle 18th century as Shikarpur lay on Bolan pass route connecting Kandahar. Merchants from the port of Thatta also shifted to Shikarpur in order to take advantage of the commercial opportunities available there. Sindhi diaspora, were mostly Khatris, have spread themselves in almost all regions of Central Asia and Russia. They had agents from Astrakhan in the west to Calcutta in the east. They had also agents at Muscat, Bandar Abbas, Yezd, Mashhad, Astrakhan, Bukhara, Samarkand, Yarkand, Khokand, Kundooz, Khollom, Kandahar, Kabul, Ghazni, Peshawar, Dera Ismael Khan, Dera Gazi Khan, Bahawalpur, Amritsar, Jaipur, Jaisalmer, Bombay, Hyderabad, Karachi, Kelat etc. The Shikarpuri Hundis were negotiable in all these places and Shikarpur was the financial 13 center. Muslim rulers were so much under financial influence of those Shikarpuris, called 14 as "Sindhworkies" that they offered many tax reliefs to them Conclusion::: We can easily conclude that Sindhis have been traveling all over the world since the time of Indus Valley civilization, doing trade of all types including import and export, founded banking houses, introduced the concept of Hundis, proved themselves as perfect 15 salesman, innovative entrepreneurs, high degree of adaptability. Today due to sad partition of our motherland in 1947, Sindhis lost their homeland but didn't lost their zeal, enthusiasm and love for their present homeland, of course not forgetting their glorious past, trying and getting success in regaining the old time recognition. It is truly said that there is no country in the world today where the Sindhi businessman has not ventured. The concept of Sindhworkies is definitely the root of present day Non Resident Indian (NRI) concept. Similarly to the example of Sindhworkies getting tax reliefs from even Muslim rulers, NRIs get red carpet welcome to invest in India. Sindhi diasporas are found even today in almost all countries around the world, working in those countries and having strong bonding with India and playing magnificent role in again International Research Journal of Management Science & Technology http://www.irjmst.com

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IRJMST

Vol 7 Issue 8 [Year 2016]

ISSN 2250 – 1959 (0nline) 2348 – 9367 (Print)

making India "World Guru" in each and every sense. References:1:

C. L. Mariwalla, History of the commerce of Sind ( from early times to 1523 AD), Jamshoro, Pakistan,1981

2:

Markovit Claude, 2000, The global world of Indian merchants, 1750-1947: Traders of sindh from Bukhara to panama, Cambridge University Press

3:

Muzaffar alam, Trade, state policy and Regional change: Aspect of Mughal: Uzbek commercial relations (1550-1750), journal of the economic and social history of the orient, volume 38.

4:

Fryer John, A new account of east India and Persia, Hakluyt society, 1909-15, vol.2

5:

Ibn Batuta, The Travels of Ibn batuta (1325-1354)Translated by H.A.R Gibbs, Delhi, Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers and Distributors,1993.

6:

Rudi Mathee, Between Venice and Surat: The trade in gold in late Safavid Iran, Modern Asian studies, vol. 34, no.1, 2000

7:

Kemp, Russian Travellers

8:

Surendra Gopal, Indians in Central Asia, Indian history congress proceedings 1996

9:

Josiah Harlan, Central Asia: Personal narrative of General Josiah Harlan, 1823-41

10:

Memon, Shikarpur

11:

Thevenot, Indian travels

12:

Mohanlal, travels in Punjab, Afghanistan and Turkistan

13:

Dr. Subhadra Anand, National integration of Sindhis, Vikas publishing house Pvt. Ltd. New Delhi, 1996

14:

Burns Alexander, 1834, A voyage on the Indus, London, reprint oxford university press

15:

S. P. Chablani, Economic conditions of Sind 1592-1833, Bombay 1951

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