The center held a historical seminar entitled “Introducing some of the Commercial Indian Communities in Arabian Gulf States at the Time of British Presence”, in which Dr. Sahib Nadwi gave a lecture introducing the origins some of the Indian communities mentioned in the Arabic sources at the Islamic ages, and in the British Documents at the time of the British presence, especially the documents of economy and commerce in the Arabian Gulf States, where the various Indian religious sects had a major role in the international trade; like were the Hindu Banyans, the Khawaja, the Bohra, the Mayman from the Muslim religious sects and others. These sects have successfully managed to from creating a solid commercial met between the Gujarati and Sindhi regions, the coastal southern Indian regions, the Arabian Gulf States, Zanzibar and the East Africa countries. Thus they attained an essential social rank among the commercial communities in these coastal commercial regions.
The lecturer reviewed the origins of these Indian communities, pointing out that many Arab sources and British documents use the word “Banyans” to mean the commercial traders, without distinction between the other Indian sects and communities, but the name is given to a specific class of Hindu hereditary social groups in India. As the name “Banyans” was used in British documents and Arabic books refer only to Indian traders, it is understood that all the Indian traders were belonging to this social Hindu group. However, the truth is that the other Indian communities from Muslims and Hindu had active participations and contributions in the commercial activities in Arabian Gulf States during that period. Hence, it is necessary to look into the origins of these commercial Indian communities and to study their relationships with the Arab commercial families that settled then in the main Indian cities.