As India completes 75 years of independence today, the country is also marking a milestone in its economic ties with Bahrain.
With a deeply entwined history spanning millennia between the two lands, Bahrain and India’s bond has only deepened since official diplomatic ties were established more than 50 years ago.
According to Indian Ambassador Piyush Srivastava, bilateral economic trade between the two economies has hit $1.65 billion (BD622 million) in the past year, marking a year-over-year growth of 55 per cent.
In the same period, Indian investments in Bahrain hit $1.5bn (BD566m) – an increase of 35pc – while Bahrain-based companies have continued to increase their investments in India, hitting almost $200m.
Bahrain and India have also been expanding their links in defence and combating climate change over the past year.
In May this year, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that the country is set to join the Combined Maritime Force (CMF), a Bahrain-based multinational naval coalition aimed at promoting security, stability and prosperity across nearly 3.2 million square miles of international waters which encompass some of the world’s most important shipping routes.
Around the same time, during the fifth round of the Foreign Office Consultations between India and Bahrain in New Delhi, the kingdom also became part of the International Solar Alliance (ISA) Framework.
The ISA is an alliance of 121 signatory countries, most being sunshine countries, which lie either completely or partly between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn and have committed to boosting co-operation in combating climate change, which is set to dramatically alter ecosystems in this region.
These deepened economic, defence and sustainability ties build on a millennia-old connection between Bahrain and India.
Indians are known to have come to Bahrain as early as 3000BC when ships plied between Harappa settlements, Bahrain, Oman and Mesopotamia in pursuit of trade.
Ancient Bahraini traders are believed to have carried out a flourishing trade of Bahraini pearls with spices from India.
In more recent times, Indian merchants established themselves in Bahrain in the late 1800s. Others moved to Bahrain from Baghdad and Basra. These merchant families came from the province of Sindh and Kathiawad region of Gujarat.
By around 1925, nearly 2,500 Indian families had settled in Bahrain, generally running small retailing businesses.
The discovery of oil in 1932 led to an influx in immigration as Indians started moving to the kingdom to start businesses or take up blue and white collar jobs. Many of Bahrain’s most prominent figures have close Indian connections. When Bahrain was a British protectorate, the Indian rupee was legal tender in the country and to this day, 100 fils is colloquially called ‘ek rupiya’ (one rupee).
Today, approximately 400,000 Indians call Bahrain their home, a number of renowned families even hold Bahraini citizenship and their roots span sociocultural, economic and diplomatic links.
As the two countries move ahead, they are intent on collaborating on pharmaceutical, IT, space, fintech and other industries.
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