The memons

It has been said pity ‘the land without history, so woe be the people without historians’. Little over a hundred years ago, the Memons were virtually unknown to the wider world. Hardly anything seemed to distinguish them from the various communities that make up the Indian sub-continent. Today they are one of the most powerful business communities in the region. The Memons are people with a rich, colourful past but without any historians to record it, let alone analyse or laud the achievements of their ancestors. Just as nature abhors a vacuum, so historians abhor a historical vacuum and tend to fill it with myths and prejudices. Until now the Memons have taken a view of history not dissimilar to the one Napoleon took. Asked by one of his generals about the impact one of his battle plans would have on history, Napoleon is believed to have said: ‘Let us make history first then let historians write it.’