Even though it is well-documented that Africans gave birth to the world, it is generally little known that the Siddi or Sheedi people, who are descendants of the Bantu people of Southeastern Africa, have lived in rural India and parts of Pakistan for the last 600 years.
The Siddi arrived to the aforementioned regions under orders from Arab and Portuguese merchants to work as slave laborers. And today, the Siddi community is numbered around 20,000 to 55,000 persons across the region with the majority of them being Sufi Muslims. There are also practicing Hindus and Roman Catholics as well among the number.
The areas Siddis dwell in are Karnataka, Gujarat, and Hyderabad in India and Makran and Karachi in Pakistan, although they can be found throughout both countries in varying number.
In a video from BBC Two, host Simon Reeve explores a Siddi community and remarks repeatedly on his shock at seeing Black Africans in India wearing traditional Indian garb.
A local leader hosts Reeve and shows him how this small community thrives and meshes culture with the mainland while still retaining their African heritage.
The leader notes that the beginnings of his people goes back as far as 1411. He also explains that the Siddis are known as exceptionally hard workers with skills in woodwork and carpentry.
But not all Siddis came to India as slaves; in fact, many also came as merchants, warriors, and traders, with the word on the street being that at one point, an African king ruled in Central India.
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Beautiful brothers and sisters!
very facinating
We have always known about this even thought it is barely highlighted in the history of the world...
love it....beautiful
I have a wonderful book on the subjet "African Elites in India " by Habshi Amarat, good reading and great pictures!!
Black is great!
Back in the day when I contemplated going to get a PhD one of the things I wanted to study was the centuries old slave trade off of the east coast of Africa that pre dates the Atlantic slave trade by centuries. Africa has been under assault for thousands of years. This is a chapter in that assault.
I was told I couldn't study this because there would be no one to form a committee that had any knowledge of this history... Your post is deeply appreciated by me. I first learned of this history after reading The African Presence in Asia: Consequences of the East African Slave Trade (Northwestern University Press, 1971.
THE STATUS QUO IN THIS VERY VERY BIASED WORLD IS ALWAYS ABOUT BLACK BE-LITTLEMENT, PREJUDICE AND MARGENILISATION BUT ONE THING YOU SHOULDn't LET THEM TAKE AWAY IS THE BLACK PRIDE AND AFRICAN ESTEEM AS OUR CONSOLATION.SEEING THE SIDDI POST IS SOMEWHAT BITTER-SWEET WELL FROM ME THOSE ARE MY LOVELY BRETHREN AND SHOULD BE WELL RESPECTED AS INDIAN CITIZENS NONE THE LESS, ONE LOVE MY PEOPLE......
I am a siddi too. My dad's origin is siddi. I still have the flat nose but the color got lighter due to my mom.