Muslims and the Minority Question across the Indian Ocean: A Conversation With Roy Bar Sadeh

In this conversation, we are entering an Indian Ocean world connected

by steamships, telegraphs, pilgrimage routes, and print. From Bombay

and the Gulf to Cairo and Mecca—and onward to Moscow and

Geneva—merchants, scholars, activists, and political exiles debated a

question that still feels urgent: how can different communities live

together without being reduced to permanent majorities and minorities?

Bombay

sits near the center of our story. Under British rule, it was a major

imperial port. But it was also a meeting place where Indian Ocean

merchants financed publications, hosted traveling scholars, and helped

ideas cross borders.

At the same time, British censuses and