Migration and Settlement.

"Arriving at his future scene of business with little beyond the credentials of his fellow castemen, after perhaps a brief apprenticeship in some older firms he [the Indian entrepreneur, G.O.] starts a shop of his own with goods advanced on credit by some large house, and after a few years, when he has made a little money, generally returns home to marry, to make fresh business connections, and then comes back to Africa to repeat, on a large scale.(7)"

This is, indeed, the general migration pattern followed by many South Asian traders. It was rather exceptional for the family eldest to make the exploring trip to India. More often he chooses his second or third son to make this first step.(8)This pattern leaves the opportunity for those who could not find a job in East Africa or who were not successful in business to go back to India or travel further to South Africa to try their luck elsewhere. India served as reservoir for new recruits in Africa as well as safety net for those who did not make it.(9)

The physical visibility of successful Indian traders may have contributed to the impression of contemporaries like Sir Bartle Frere and Colonal Rigby that nearly the whole of the local trade of Zanzibar is in the hands of British Indian Subjects, viz. Banyans, Khojas, and Borahs.(10)The ‘Indian’ connection of business contacts was intensively utilized by these traders. These connections consisted of importers, exporters, wholesalers, retailers and shippers who were generally, but not always, from the same religious community as the Indian traders in East Africa. These overseas as well as local communal business ties gave Indian traders an important advantage over their Swahili and Arab rivals.