HISTORY: Gandhijis hosts diasporic trajectories Article | 6 dcembre, 2011 - 16:00

This year marks the 110th anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi's visit to Mauritius. In a letter to Dr K. Hazareesingh, dated 26.5.1936, he confirmed his visit and later mentioned that I stayed in the house of some Muslim friends. Gandhiji was referring principally to Ajum Goolam Hossen and Ibrahim Sulleiman Atchia, where he stayed. They provided transport and arranged most of his meetings with the local Indian intelligentsia and indentured population. Gandhiji was travelling with his wife and three children. He seemed to have landed on 28 October 1901 and booked at the Orient Hotel (Waqf Building, today) on the Port Louis waterfront. News of his arrival quickly reached the ears of Seth Ajum Goolam Hossen (AGH), the most influential merchant of the Surtee bazaar. AGH was occupying a large mansion at the corner of ex-Desforges (today SSR) and Bourbon Streets. He was heading the family firm of Ajum Goolam Hossen &Co which had a dense commercial network in the Indian ocean area. He was trading with South Africa and knew well the South African firm of Dada Abdoollah&Co, Gandhiji's employer. No doubt, AGH was aware of Gandhiji's legal prowess and concern for the indentured Indians. This explains his readiness to welcome Gandhiji and his family and to extend the usual Gujarati conviviality to a fellow countryman. Gandhiji and his family must have felt quite at home among AGHs family members. Gandhiji himself was born of a family of the Modhbania caste of Porbandar, a major commercial seaport. (Markovits. C 2007) dominated by a bustling merchant class of Muslim Meimons, Jains and Hindus. According to Bissondoyal. U., the plural experiences of Gandhiji was further enriched by his mother who belonged to the Pramani sect, where the priest read both the Gita and the Koran at religious functions. Gandhijis stay in Mauritius is fairly well documented, especially the party organized for him in the evening of 13 November 1901 by the Surtee Sunnee Vohra community at the newly acquired Maison Rochecouste at the Champ de Mars, known as Taher Bagh today, in the midst of some 200 guests. Not much has been written on this merchant class as lamented by historians. This brief article will focus on the origin and the pulsating economic and social life of these Surtee merchants at the dawn of the twentieth century. Antecedent stage This Indian merchant class started during the French period when South Indian merchants were very active. The early British period saw the economic activities of a very enterprising Parsi merchant by the name of Ratanjee Bickajee. (Kalla. A.C, 1986). It was the onset of the indenture system based on the importation of Indian labour from 1834 onwards that attracted

the grain and other Indian foodstuffs merchants (Meimon) of Calcutta to Port Louis. By the 1840s, they were joined by merchants from Surat and its hinterland between the rivers Tapti and Narbada and were known as Souratees or Surtees. They were mostly textile merchants and as was customary in India they were referred to as Vohras. (cf Jain Bavangami). As the port city of Surat was the major port of the Mugal empire(Das Gupta. A. 1970) and the first area of European commercial activities in India, there was a strong merchant class based mostly on family firms. The Surtee merchants came from three main areas in the region surrounding Surat. The first migrants came from the city of Rander, a stone throw down the river from Surat. In 1844, Bahemia started the business of money changer on Royal Street, Port Louis and later on went into the hardware trade. He was followed in the 1850s by the family firm of Peepory or Piperdy registered in Mauritius as Goolam Hossen& Co and later on as Ajum Goolam Hossen & Co. This large firm was involved in wholesale and retail trade, import and export, shipping and real estate. It had already trading centres in Burma, Singapore and in the Arabian peninsula and dealt mostly in foodstuffs, textile and timber. Like all Indian merchants, the Piperdys were heavily in the real estate business. From Mauritius AGH expanded to Runion, Madagascar and South Africa. In 1897, the Raderee firm of Ahmed Gulam Mahomed Ajum, popularly known as Alloo and closely related to the Bahemia, based at Warden Road, Bombay joined the merchants in Port Louis engaging in the export of sugar to India. These two last named merchants came with huge capital. Earlier in the 1870s, Randerees, and Suratees like the Toorawa, Simjee and other families, who had a capital backup in India, migrated to Port Louis. They were mostly wholesalers of textile goods. They opened dukans (retail shops) in the rural areas of the north and east for example, Mamode Goolam Simjee and Ibrahim Ismail Toorawa formed a sociton 6 November 1888 to operate a dukan in Flacq. (NA 22/60). Gujarati marchands arabes The same pattern had been adopted by people from Kathor who started their coming from the late 1940s. The Mamoojees (Kathrada) were the first family to start business and they were followed by the Timols, Vawdas, Vayids and others. They opened wholesale and retail trading points in Port Louis and were active in the opening of dukans in the northern part of the island at Poudre dOr, Rivire du Rempart and Piton. As they came from a prosperous and busy textile producing town, they had capital and business competencies. Both the Souratees and Khathorians started linkages with the local British firms to gain access to manufacturing companies in Britain and other countries. They became wholesalers supplying fellow retailers. The next big group of Gujarati marchands arabes came from the agricultural village of Barbodhan., some 10kl from Surat. In 1861, Assenjee Atchia led a group of 8 Barbodhanians consisting of his son Dawjee, Ibrahim Sulleiman Atchia and other village folks,, such as Moosajee (Gajra), Aria and others. The Atchias, who must have come on a reconnoitering trip earlier, started a dukan at Belle Rose on the main road to Curepipe. They targeted the indentured population of the nearby sugar estates. They were subsequently joined by the Kalas (Moussa and Ismael), Nalla, Hossen (Rawat) Jeewas, Rajahs and others. They were more of the pedlarstype in other words from the main shop people were sent to the labour camps to sell small goods. The Atchias also encouraged other folks to open dukans in other parts of the Central Plateau. The Rajahs had a dukan at St Pierre while the Hossens were at Moka. In the late 1870s, Dawjee Atchia moved to Curepipe and Ibrahim Sulleiman started a dukan in Rose Hill. There were also a large number of individuals, who were traders, dukan workers, colporteurs and clerks and ; came from towns and villages of the Surat hinterland, such as Panoli, Bhodan, Ikleswar and Dhabel. To complete the list there were two Surtee transnational companies connected with the Indian Ocean trade network with agents in Mauritius. These agents, namely Aboo Baker. M. Taher representing the Sulleiman brothers from Rander based at Bombay and Allam for Cassim

Mamoojee&Co of Calcutta. These companies were engaged in shipping, retail and wholesale trade, import and export and real estate. Gandhijis hosts by the dawn of the new century had achieved much salience in the economic life of this colony. Hitie. E, writing in the Le Vrai Progrs Colonial of 29 October 1901 and referring to the Indian merchant class, commented Have they not now become rich ? Without them how are we going to sell our sugar ? (quoted by Thacoor. D, 1979).