'The whole world is but one family' - Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan Australia

Why is India still neglected in Australian thinking,
both at popular level as well as academic, when
its rising industrial power and global clout are
beginning to equal that of China which so dominates
Australia’s future policy projections? And why is the
vast majority of Indians so ignorant of the rapidly
changing nature and increasingly sophisticated
attitudes of cosmopolitan Australia? Misconceptions
abound on both sides despite a very familiar cricket
fraternity: a common English language and mutually
inherited colonial institutions in law, education, health
and federal parliamentary democracy are equally
important links.
The imperial umbrella of the British Raj provided the
two colonial cousins with a common approach from
a distant Mother Country. The one being superiority
in racial attitudes to India’s culture, the other social
superiority to a convict society. Even earlier but
a matter of academic controversy is the possible
encounter between Aboriginal First Australians and
those still lively tribal peoples such as the Gonds
of eastern India and the Tamils of the south. Recent
arrivals of illegal boat people on Australia’s northwest
coastal reefs, floating in on strong Indian currents has
again opened up that question. This research over a
long period of time both in state library archives, on
the spot interviews all over Australia with a variety of
people who were linked in one way or another between
the two countries; and to-ing and fro-ing between all
three countries prompted the two authors to document
not only an insightful relationship of their own (
having enjoyed homes in Britain, India and Australia)
but those also of governmental, political, sporting,
business connections that unfolded at times from
undocumented material or long forgotten personal
diaries and records. Surely then there is already a
solid and lengthy foundation - indeed from 1788
onwards when food from Calcutta and exchange of
letters between governors was essential for survival -
for Australia and India to build even stronger natural
ties, especially in today’s complex global world.
Economic imperatives have indeed forced Australia to
accept its natural environment of influence and trade
which did exist in the earliest relationship until Anglo/
Celtic shutters slammed down on Asian neighbours in
1901 with Federation. The threat of ‘cheap Asian labor’
shouted from the political hustling had its effects. At
last it is now taking note of its eastern neighborhood.
Some scant knowledge remains of horses, the famous
Walers being shipped out of Victoria and Western
Australia for the Indian cavalry and polo-playing
princely kingdoms; jarrah logs exported for the sudden
Indo Aussie Links - Peggy Holroyd*
e x p a n s i o n
of the Raj
communication
railway system
after the
1857 Sepoy
Rebellion (The
Mutiny).
Many other
links were
created in the
first decades
- the first
export from
the new colony
to Calcutta was cedar logs from New South Wales.
Exchange of governors, army contingents, large
Victorian families off-loaded sons into the Indian
Civil Service and as British Army soldiers and
administrators and business people, while one other
would be detailed to pioneer land in Australia or
survive as a jackaroo. Governesses for princely
families and who guarded fabulous treasure at
flamboyant weddings to prevent theft.They also
taught miserly nizams ballroom dancing. Then there
were the British soldiers sweltering in Calcutta jails
for their misdemeanors seeking permission from
the authorities to be transferred to Sydney’s convict
quarters — superior by far! Houghtons vineyards;
servants turned into stone masons for some of our
heritage buildings, shepherds in South Australia,
cameleers - Pathans and Baluchis from British India’s
North West Frontier provinces, their camels padding
down the fragile pindan earth to become the future
roads across the outback. All contributed to Australia’s
uncommon history of Asian encounter.
There are even humorous records from Aboriginal
mobs of initial impressions of the turbaned men in
their midst. And what of Bengal Rum, a component of
the Aussie love of grog right from the very beginning?
And of Austral-India appearing on early maps?
*Peggy Holroyd AM lived in New Delhi soon after
independence in 1947, and has returned to India
inumerable times. She is the author of Indian Music,
East Comes West: Social Change amongst Asian
families in England and An ABC of Indian Culture.
Her latest book is Colonial Cousins: A surprising
history of connections between India and Australia
written jointly with Joyce Westrip.