Sadia Shepard, an American writer, and filmmaker traveled to India in search of her ancestry and to better understand her history, which is a blend of Protestant, Jewish, and Islamic cultures. She left with 18 diaries full of memories that she compiled into a book. The Girl from Foreign: A Search for Shipwrecked Ancestors, Forgotten…
Various groups frequently oppose the way specific subjects are presented in school textbooks. Most recently, McGraw-Hill apologized for using the phrase “the Atlantic Slave Trade” to describe slavery in its World Geography textbook: “The Atlantic Slave Trade brought millions of people from Africa to the southern United States to work on agricultural plantations between the…
By naming itself ‘Hitler,’ an Indian business has sparked an uproar. The Jewish community in Ahmedabad, where the men’s clothes store is located, is requesting that the name be altered, claiming that the proprietors are not unaware of Hitler’s history. Meanwhile, the shop’s owners claim that it was named after one of their grandfathers, who…
Malayalam-speaking Jews from the Kochi (previously Cochin) district of Kerala, located along the Malabar Coast in southwestern India, are known as Cochin Jews, Cochini, or Kerala Jews. The Paradesis (White Jews), Malabaris (Black Jews), and Meshuchrarim (Meshuchrarim) were three caste-like groupings of Cochin Jews (Brown Jews). Only about 50 Cochin Jews survived on the Malabar…
Synagogueinte Naatil (In the Land of Synagogue) is a historical fiction film released in 2011. This film has English subtitles and is in Malayalam. The translation is not up to par. I’d like to express my gratitude to Mr. Thaha Ibrahin for allowing me to upload this video. Thaha is a unique individual who lived…
As trade between India and Israel grows, Jews of Indian ancestry are seen as a key to strengthening connections. New Delhi has devised a strategy to strengthen ties between Israelis of Indian descent and their ancestral nation. India’s and Israel’s political leaders are fortifying their economic and political relations through an unexpected cultural link: their…
The history of the Jews in India is divided into three historical Jewish communities, each with a population of 6,000 people (1997) and located in a distinct geographical area: the community of Cochin in the south of the subcontinent, the Bene Israel in the vicinity of Bombay, and the Baghdadi community (“those of Baghdad”) around…
The once-thriving Baghdadi Jewish community has shrunk to only 20 members. Kolkata had a sizable Jewish community before India’s independence in 1947. They were known as “Baghdadi Jews” because they came from modern-day Iraq and Syria in the late 1800s. Today, the Jewish world is rapidly dwindling. Only 20 Jews live in the city of…