ITTN was on hand to attend the official launch of Looking East: Ireland + India – a new multimedia exhibition at EPIC The Irish Emigration Museum – chronicling and celebrating 75 years of diplomatic relations between Ireland and India.
As well as enjoying a reception featuring entertainment and an array of Indian dishes, attendees heard from Dr Catherine Healy – DFA Historian-in-Residence at EPIC The Irish Emigration Museum; EPIC chief executive, Aileesh Carew; author Cauvery Madhavan; and former Taoiseach Leo Varadkar TD, who spoke about his Indian heritage.
The exhibition – which is a partnership with the Department of Foreign Affairs – covers various aspects of the relationship between the two countries: including the links between Ireland and India’s anti-colonial struggles; the stories of Irish soldiers who fought for the British Army in India; and the long record of Indian migration to Ireland.
The exhibition shows how Irish-born civil servants – working for Britain – ran seven of the eight provinces that made up India under British rule, by the end of the 19th Century.
It also shows that Indian immigration to Ireland dates as far back as the 1700s. Today, the Indian diaspora is one of Ireland’s fastest-growing immigrant communities.
The Looking East exhibition runs until November 30. Meanwhile, on August 22, the Ireland-India theme is the subject of a talk (5:30pm-6:30pm; full details on epichq.com) studying 250 years of Irish migration to India.
