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South Asian Heritage Month: Aaliya Ali




‘Paki’. ‘Go back to where you came from.’ ‘You’re not British.’

These phrases aren’t unique to one individual’s experience. They are phrases common to the experience of being South Asian in Britain. Almost as if your identity being questioned because ‘you don’t look British’ is a rite of passage. The constant dehumanisation and villainisation of South Asians in British media has resulted in this harmful rhetoric seeping into the mindsets of the wider British public. From Kirandeep Kaur to Altab Ali, this rhetoric is having very real, devastating consequences for the safety of South Asians in Britain. Therefore, this South Asian Heritage Month, it is important for all communities to work together to challenge these harmful notions which are inciting violence in cities across the country and to recognise the contributions of the South Asian community to Britain. 


To understand why this rhetoric has taken root, we have to understand where it comes from. From colonisation to Partition and the immigration of South Asians to Britain, this rich, albeit tragic history has shaped the Britain we know today. Britain first colonised South Asia in the early 17th century through the East India Company, and after an uprising in 1857, direct imperial control soon took over. During the empire's reign in the region, catastrophe after catastrophe struck, the consequences of which are still felt by South Asians generations on. During World War Two, for example, the man-made Bengal Famine (caused by the forced increase of rice exports out of the country amid fears of Japanese invasion and a shortage of food for wartime soldiers) resulted in the preventable death of an estimated three million people. Anti-colonial uprisings were met with massacre, peaceful protesters gunned down for daring to demand their own country back. Moreover, once slavery had been abolished, South Asians were shipped off to British colonies such as Fiji and Mauritius to work on sugar and cotton plantations, where conditions were notoriously harsh and abusive, an extension of the system they supposedly just ended.


Throughout, the British introduced a divide and rule system, sowing the thread of religious and ethnic hatred amongst communities to prevent uprisings against the British colonisers. This hatred, spread deliberately across communities, would eventually culminate in the Partition of India into two states: India and Pakistan (which then included what is now Bangladesh).


Partition resulted in over a million dead and around 15 million people displaced. Based on religious demographics and a line drawn across the map by a British lawyer who had never even visited the country, people mass-migrated across the new border, splitting Muslim, Hindu and Sikh South Asians from one another almost overnight. Millions of South Asians to this day are unable to visit their ancestral homes, communities still haunted by this bloody past. 


The economic toll of colonisation, however, is just as haunting. Economist Utsa Patnaik has calculated that Britain drained the equivalent of $45 trillion in today's money from India between 1765 and 1938 through unjust trade, unequal tax systems and the looting of diamonds from the region. Among them the infamous Kohinoor, now known as one of the 'Crown Jewels'.


Post-Partition and post-war, the British Nationality Act 1948 resulted in the mass migration of South Asians to Britain, inviting people to fill the labour shortages left by the war and help rebuild a country that had plundered the resources of their own.


In the 1970s, despite enduring the injustices of colonisation and helping make Britain 'great' again after the war, South Asians were subjected to a large-scale racist campaign, fuelled by anti-immigration rhetoric from politicians and exacerbated by economic anxieties. Fascist campaigns targeted areas with high South Asian populations, such as Bradford, Southall, Sheffield and Brick Lane. This resulted in the murder of multiple people in racially motivated attacks. Among them, Altab Ali, a 24-year-old Bengali garment worker stabbed to death in Whitechapel in 1978, whose killing brought thousands of Bengali Londoners onto the streets in protest. Inspired by the civil rights movement, this second generation of South Asians fought back against the cruelty of that campaign, refusing to be silent.


Almost 50 years later, and nothing much has changed. The 1970s had 'Paki-bashing' and 2026 has had the 'Unite The Kingdom' marches, drawing tens of thousands onto London's streets. The name of the game might have changed, but the goal is still the same: to terrorise the South Asian community into feeling like they don't belong in the country they call home.


Given the events of the past couple of years, from the racist riots that followed the Southport murders, to a sitting Prime Minister warning Britain risked becoming an 'island of strangers’ and sitting MPs calling for visa bans from Pakistan, it is fitting that the theme for this year's South Asian Heritage Month is Unity in Diversity. Because communities rallying together against hate and division is what is going to unite the kingdom. Communities fighting against the rise of the far right and protecting our South Asian brothers and sisters is the type of unity we need in these modern times of division.


Decades on and money and diamonds aren’t the only things that have been stolen from South Asia. Many aspects of the culture have been appropriated and re-branded, made digestible for Western society. Dupattas are now Scandinavian scarves. Turmeric milk (also known as haldi doodh) has been replaced by turmeric lattes. Shalwars and jhumkas are now part of the boho chic aesthetic. Whether it is racist rioters having pakoras on the Southbank following protests to deport people of colour or the appropriation of South Asian culture, people have become far too comfortable with accepting our culture and not our people. You cannot have a Friday night curry, order an iced chai or wear a dupatta while calling us a problem. You cannot build a country on the backs of South Asian labour, on wealth extracted from South Asian soil, and then tell the people whose grandparents built it that they don't belong here. The debt is not ours to repay for being ‘allowed’ into the country. It never was.


Whilst this South Asian Heritage Month, I call upon all communities to recognise our culture, value and work; we also need to recognise the differences amongst the diaspora. The South Asian experience is not a monolith, and I think that is the beauty of our diversity. South Asia is comprised of eight countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka- over 2,000 distinct ethnic groups and more than 1,600 languages. Centuries of traditions, multiple faiths, and histories that are both shared and entirely distinct from one another. South Asian culture is more than Bollywood, more than Bend It Like Beckham, and more than a cheap laugh made at our expense on Little Britain. Our diversity is not a punchline. 


To exemplify this, I wish to highlight some of the British South Asians who are acting as trailblazers for their communities and sharing their stories. Aina Khan is a journalist who has travelled the world empowering communities to tell their own stories, particularly those from South Asia and her own heritage. Mishal Hussain has written a book called Broken Threads, bringing her family's Partition story to a wider audience and reclaiming that history in her own voice. And Nadiya Hussain (winner of the Great British Bake Off and so much more) has spoken about her experience growing up as a South Asian in Britain, empowering many others to do so. 


This year, more than ever, South Asian Heritage Month is not just a celebration; it is a statement. A statement to the people of Britain that this is our country too and we will continue to live and celebrate unapologetically. A statement that we refuse to be treated like unwelcome guests in a country we help to build every day. We cannot raise the next generation with the same fear so many of us have experienced. The hatred of a few should not dictate their sense of self or what it means to them to be British and South Asian. So this year we must celebrate fully and freely. Because celebration in the face of hate is not trivial. It is resistance. 



References:

Bengal Famine — Britannica: britannica.com/topic/Bengal-famine-of-1943

$45 trillion figure (Utsa Patnaik) — Al Jazeera: aljazeera.com/opinions/2018/12/19/how-britain-stole-45-trillion-from-india

Altab Ali — South Asian Britain, Connecting Histories: southasianbritain.org/events/the-battle-of-brick-lane-1978

South Asian Heritage Month theme, countries, language and ethnic group figures — South Asian Heritage Trust: southasianheritage.org.uk/south-asian-heritage-month

Reform UK visa ban proposals targeting Pakistan — GB News: gbnews.com/politics/reform-uk-visa-bans-pakistan-afghanistan-deportations



 
 
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