By Himadri Banerjee Formerly Jadavpur University Kolkata
Journal Sage vol 43, issue 2, December 2016. (pp353-355).
Sikhs in Asia Pacific: Travels among the Sikh Diaspora from Yangon to Kobe

Author: Swarn Singh Kahlon, Chandigarh
Publisher: Manohar Publisher, New Delhi
Year of Publication: 2016; Pages 352; Price. Rs. 1195/- (Hard Bound)

Swarn Singh Kahlon's volume delineates his varied engagements with Sikhs of eleven Asia Pacific countries. He visited all of them except Fiji to write his second book in a global trilogy depicting history of Sikh migration and settlement scattered from Myanmar to Japan. It begins with an introductory note outlining the area covered in the study and refers briefly to the methodology that not only points to author's dissimilar journeys but also underlines his keenness to determine immigrant Sikhs' numerical strength and wide-ranging institutions built by them in their new residential sites. The study is divided into thirteen chapters with eighteen appendices which examine how these dotted locations accommodated nearly two-thirds of the community's transnational migrants before Indian independence. Eleven of them narrate history of Sikh settlement in a specific country extended from Myanmar to Japan, but no less committed to review how and why popularity of some of these settlements had waxed and waned since the commencement of the community's long-distance journeys beyond India in the second half of the nineteenth century. Its twelfth chapter takes note of these Sikhs' participation in India's struggle for freedom. Kahlon emphasises that colonial patronage through military and police recruitment had played a crucial role in early Sikh voyages through the port of Kolkata. It remained trendy until there were changes in the perceptions of the community's crossings during decades following partition of Punjab and independence of India. He alludes to how Sikh police and armed personnel were sometimes hated and feared for their overbearing behaviour towards local folks in countries where Sikhs have still managed to 354 Book Reviews reside in significant numbers. The author suggests how some of these experiences had remained an integral part of the larger colonial legacy which was complicated by the coming of some new ethnic groups introducing fresh problems to regional past. The study emphasises immigrants' enthusiasm in founding the community's sacred space and other secular institutions which would make them 'visible' and 'distinct' in host society...