Vietnam-born Indians return home<\/p>\n
Saigon's former Indian residents return to their roots.
\nSatyanarayan Sivaraman of Inter Press Service reports.<\/p>\n
HO CHI MINH CITY (IPS): French, Vietnamese, Tamil -- it is a
\nstrange mix of tongues that greets the ear inside Delhi, Ho Chi
\nMinh City's only Indian restaurant. But for Mohammed Housaine, a
\nmiddle-aged Indian businessman who has become a patron of the
\nplace, this is the only natural way to converse.<\/p>\n
Born to Tamil parents in French colonial Vietnam, Housaine's
\nfluency in the three languages is the only memory left of his
\ndays in Ho Chi Minh City -- then called Saigon -- before he fled
\nalong with his family when triumphant communist troops drove out
\nthe U.S. forces in 1975.<\/p>\n
Two decades later, Housaine is back in the city where he was
\nborn and brought up, not on a mere nostalgia trip but to try and
\nreclaim the ancestral property his family left behind.<\/p>\n
He is just one of hundreds of hopeful former Indian residents
\nwho are making trips to Ho Chi Minh City, attracted by the
\npolitical and economic changes brought in recent years by the
\nreformist Vietnamese government.<\/p>\n
\"We owned several houses in the city but now I have to pay to
\nstay here in a hotel,\" laments Housaine who migrated to France
\nseeking asylum there in the mid-seventies.<\/p>\n
Vietnam has no policy as yet on compensating former residents
\nfor lost property. But Housaine is hopeful that with the newly
\npatched up relations between Vietnam and the United States, which
\nis also trying to reclaim some of its pre-1975 properties in Ho
\nChi Minh City, officials here will consider the Indian's cases
\ntoo.<\/p>\n
Latest reports say Hanoi has approved the return of some of
\nthe U.S properties to the U.S government.<\/p>\n
There are no formal estimates of the worth of property in Ho
\nChi Minh City belonging to former Indian residents, but it is
\nbelieved to be in the range of several hundred million dollars.<\/p>\n
Much of the appreciation in real estate prices has occurred in
\nrecent years, with foreign companies pledging over US$2.9 billion
\nworth of investment into the city since 1988.<\/p>\n
Indians formed the second largest ethnic minority group in
\nSaigon, after the Chinese community, with an estimated 50,000 of
\nthem living here up to the early 1970s. A large number of the
\nIndians were from Tamil Nadu who came here during the previous
\ncentury from French colonies in South India.<\/p>\n
Many Indians left Saigon before its fall to Vietnamese
\ncommunist forces. And while some stayed on for a few years more,
\nthey were forced out of business by socialist policies imposed by
\nthe new administration.<\/p>\n
The Indian community of Saigon included textile traders,
\nmoney-lenders, real estate developers, blue-and white-collar
\nemployees.<\/p>\n
But the several hundred Indians who were left behind in Ho Chi
\nMinh City were all mostly poor artisans, mechanics and petty
\ntraders.<\/p>\n
Due to the strong political ties between Vietnam and India,
\nwhich were both on the side of the socialist bloc during the Cold
\nWar, these remaining Indians were the only foreigners in the
\ncountry to be given official recognition and patronage by Hanoi.<\/p>\n
Not all Indians coming back here, however, are after lost
\nproperty. Many are looking forward to starting new business
\nventures including several large business groups that originated
\nin pre-communist Saigon but shifted to Singapore, Malaysia and
\nIndia in 1975.<\/p>\n
\"Our roots are here in Saigon and with this opening up we hope
\nto revive our historical business link with Vietnam,\" says a
\nsenior executive of the Southern Petrochemical Industries Corp
\n(SPIC), which is owned by the Madras-based M A M Ramaswamy Group
\nthat started more than half a century ago in Saigon.<\/p>\n
The Group is negotiating with Vietnamese authorities to set up
\na fertilizer plant near here based on offshore natural gas.<\/p>\n
But small Indian traders and businessmen who once formed the
\nbulk of Saigon's Indian community are finding the going rather
\ndifficult in Vietnam.<\/p>\n
Complains jewelry dealer L.M. Basheer: \"Only foreigners coming
\nwith large capital investments are being welcomed while small
\nbusinessmen like us are not even allowed to set up shop\".<\/p>\n
Vietnamese authorities have historical reasons for
\ndiscouraging large numbers of former Indian residents from coming
\nback to Ho Chi Minh City. Many Vietnamese remember well and
\nresent the virtual monopoly Indian and Chinese traders exerted
\nover the local economy before its liberation by the communists.<\/p>\n
Indian traders in particular acquired a bad reputation among
\nthe Vietnamese due to their involvements in the money lending
\nbusiness charging exorbitant interests from debtors.<\/p>\n
The Vietnamese themselves are also now attempting to become
\nentrepreneurs, and local city authorities are actively
\ndiscouraging competitors and blocking the influx of foreigners
\ninto the petty trade and small business sectors.<\/p>\n
In the late 1970s, members of the city's Chinese minority fled
\nin droves because of alleged racial persecution.<\/p>\n
Many here say the authorities are trying to avoid a repeat of
\nthe incident, and are watching out for ethnic tensions that may
\narise due to the frustration of local people unable to do well in
\nthe changing free market economy.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/vietnam-born-indians-return-home-1447893297",
"image": ""
},
"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
}