INDIAN MIGRATION TO NEW ZEALAND

Abstract

Migration of Indians to New Zealand from the Navsari and Surat regions of Gujarat province in  western India and Jalandhar and Hoshiarpur from Punjab  commenced   on a mild scale about a hundred years ago. The reasons for migration grew from  economic, political, and demographic considerations. The economic decline of the  region of Gujarat under British rule in the nineteenth century was the major factor  responsible for encouraging Indians to leave the area. The result of the worsening  economic situation and the growth of population was "increasing poverty, rural  underemployment and the decline of village industries. The response of the Indian  peasant was either acceptance and increasing poverty or movement away from the area.  Many chose the second alternative and amongst these were the Indians who came to New  Zealand. The people of the Navsari and Surat regions had always been in close touch  with the people of the Western world and with the increasing pressures of the British  colonial rule, the desire for prosperity was more intensely felt among these people. New Zealand seemed to provide them with an opportunity to improve their economic and  material status.