The role of Indian women in SA’s road to democracy

BETWEEN 1860 and 1911, 152184 immigrants were recruited as indentured labourers to work in different spheres of Natal’s economy. Free or “passenger” (immigrants unencumbered by contractual labour system) Indians followed in the wake of indentured labour to Natal.

After 1911, the majority of the labourers remained in Natal, making it their home. By the 1940s, the next generation of Indians became the backbone of the emerging industrial working class in Natal. During apartheid, Indians, together with Africans and coloureds, were considered nonwhites and subject to numerous hardships.

South Africans of Indian descent are now third and fourth generation and identify as South Africans, with many