Transimperial connections: East African Goan perspectives on ‘Goa 1961’

Throughout 2011, events celebrating, debating and criticizing the 50 years of Goa's existence within the Indian Union took place across Goa. These debates oscillated between the poles of perceiving what happened on the 19 December 1961 as either ‘liberation’ or ‘occupation’, reflecting the broad spectrum of perspectives at the time. Missing from these discussions were the views of Goans beyond Goa, across the Indian Ocean in East Africa and further afield. Even when divided by the Indian Ocean from life in Goa, they retained an interest in their country of origin. This paper uses archival and oral history sources to contextualize and understand East African Goans' responses, to address this gap in the literature, to problematize some existing accounts of the events and to draw attention to the significance of transimperial connections across the Indian Ocean. I argue that the lack of active involvement in political developments by the majority of Goans – whether they were in Goa or in East Africa – was in...