November 2010 marks the 150th anniversary of the first arrival of Indian indentured labourers on the shores of then “Natal Colony “ and to commemorate this historic event SAMNET commissioned renowned historian  Professor Goolam Vahed to author  a  book  to  highlight the muslim contribution to the anti apartheid struggle.

We have great pleasure in announcing that Professor Vahed has honored us not only with a wonderful compilation, of people who made a significant impact on the community and the anti apartheid struggle, titled MUSLIM PORTRAITS, THE ANTI APARTHEID STRUGGLE but also an academic work that will be sought after collectors item.

The history of this country has been dramatically influenced by Muslims in all facets and must be recorded for posterity. The book is envisaged to be the first part of a series of works to indelibly record the historical role that Muslims have played in the South African story and to capture a history that is rapidly being forgotten. 

SAMNET believes it is imperative, nay incumbent, on the Muslim community to ensure that we record and promote the history of our community, our contribution to every facet of the historical narrative and development of our wonderful society and country both to educate our own community and the general population

At a time when Islam and Muslims are increasingly under scrutiny and often associated with violence, oppression of women and terrorism we need to ensure that the contribution of Muslims to our society is highlighted so that we can proudly take our place as patriotic citizens.

Sadly in the post 1994 society there is a disturbing waning of political and social activism within our community and the younger generations appear to have lost their interest in Politics but we are confident that this book can serve as an inspiration to rekindle the passion for politics and social justice that characterised the youth of preceding generations.

We believe that this wonderful book can go a long way to stirring the interests of Muslims in politics and perhaps the stories of other Muslims who rose above the constraints of apartheid and often, family and societal pressure will inspire our young people to greater things.

SAMNET is intent on donating copies of this work to schools, libraries, tertiary institutions, Parliamentarians, media houses and other for a of influence.
SAMNET invites you to contribute to the publication of this historical work and SAMNET will record and acknowledge your support in the book.
We have structured the following tiers of contributions:

PLATINUM SPONSOR                    R100,000.00   1 ONLY
GOLD SPONSORS                         R  50,000.00   5 ONLY
SILVER/ CORPORATE SPONSORS   R  25,000.00

BRONZE SPONSORS                     R  10,000.00

FAMILY SPONSORS                       R    5,000.00

Individual sponsorships of any amount are most welcome
Please look at the curriculum vitae of the author and the list below of people covered in the book.
For further information please contact the SAMNET office at 031 2074223.

Thank you

Dr Faisal Suliman
Chair - SAMNET

Curriculum Vitae
Prof Goolam Vahed
Goolam Vahed is Associate Professor in the School of Anthropology, Gender and Historical Studies, University of KwaZulu-Natal. He is a leading scholar of South African Indian history and has published widely in the field. Recent books include The Making of a Political Reformer: Gandhi in South Africa (2005) (with Surendra Bhana) and Inside Indenture (2007) (with Ashwin Desai).
Goolam Vahed holds a PhD in History from Indiana University, Bloomington, USA. Currently he is a lecturer in history at the School of Anthropology, Gender, and Historical Studies, Faculty of Humanities, University of KwaZulu Natal.
Dr Vahed taught various topics including
·       History of America to 1870;
·       Topics in 20th Century History: The USA Since 1945;
·       Industrialisation in History: England; Background to the Contemporary World;
·       African History to 1800;
·       Themes in World History.
His research interests include Immigrant and Transnational Religion, Culture, and Ethnicity; Sport, Culture, Society and Identities. He is currently researching the history of Indian Muslims in Queensland. 
Dr Vahed's recent publications include 'Young Muslims in Brisbane: Negotiating Cultural Isolation and Alienation' Journal of Social Sciences.  Special Issue No. 10 (2008): 35 - 52.  'Post Apartheid South African Muslim Migration to Brisbane, Australia' Loyola Journal of Social Sciences: XXII.1 (Jan-June 2008): 7 - 32.

A literary delight 07 Apr 2010 Nalini Naidoo
BOOK REVIEW
Dear Ahmedbhai Dear Zuleikabehn: The Letters of Zuleika Mayat and Ahmed Kathrada, 1979 – 1989
Compiled by Goolam Vahed and Thembisa Waetjen
THIS literary treasure was discovered quite by accident. Goolam Vahed was researching a soon to be published work on the Women’s Cultural Group which produced the hugely popular cook book Indian Delights. Among the organisation’s files he discovered the letters ­between the editor of Indian Delights, Zuleika Mayat, and Robben Island prisoner Ahmed Kathrada.
The correspondence also started by chance. Mayat had lost her husband in a road accident. Kathrada knew her brother, Dr Abdulhak “Bis” Bismillah, who was his former flat mate, and wrote a letter conveying his condolences to the family. Mayat recalls her mother urging her to reply to the letter, saying: “This man is in prison yet he took the time to remember our family.”
So began 10 years of correspondence that allows a peek into the private lives of two people whose worlds intersect on some levels and are vastly divergent on others. It gives insight into Mayat’s community and aspects of incarceration on Robben Island. Above all, it offers a sense of the history of both repression and resistance in what is increasingly becoming to feel like an extraordinary time — South Africa in the apartheid era.
There are everyday matters discussed in the letters — family, mutual friends, religion, culture and politics. All of this in quaint, gentle language adding up to beautifully written prose. Dear Ahmedbhai Dear Zulelikhabhen really is a most delightful read.

Inside Indian Indenture
A South African Story, 1860-1914
Ashwin Desai, Goolam Vahed
Description
Many were filled with hopes as high as Mahjoub's stars as they crossed the Indian Ocean, making their way from India to Durban in southern Africa in the late 1800s. But dreams of a better life and the opportunity to save money and return to the village as 'success stories' were not to be for many who returned 'home' with less than they had started out with, and found that home was no longer the place they had left. Neither were they the same people. Caste had been transgressed, parents had died and spaces for reintegration closed as colonialism tightened its grip. Home for these wandering exiles was no more.

Inside Indian Indenture is a timely and monumental work which makes a significant contribution to our understanding of South African Indian history. It tells a story about the many beginnings and multiple journeys that made up the indentured experience. The authors seek to trespass directly into the lives of the indentured themselves. They explore the terrain of the everyday by focusing on religious and cultural expressions leisure
activities, power relations on the plantations, the weapons of resistance and forms of collaboration that were developed in conflicts with the colonial overlords. Fascinating accounts brimming with desire, skulduggery and tender mercies, as much as with oppression and exploitation, show that the indentured were as much agents as they were victims and silent witnesses.

To read this book is to enter their world, to meet real people in all their ambiguities and complexities as they danced the uncertain edge between improvisation and resignation, to know the dreams that fill the souls of wandering exiles. Not only does it substantially revise the contours of South African Indian historiography, it starts to weave these themes into the mainstream of Southern African studies. It also situates itself in comparative work on indenture especially in Fiji and Mauritius and extends this work by making the South African experience of indenture available to other scholars.

(NB: November 2010 is the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the first ship of indentured Indian labourers in South Africa. This book is an updated special commemorative edition (now including an extensive index) of the previously published book Inside Indenture)
About the Author/s
Ashwin Desai holds a Masters degree from Rhodes University and a doctorate from Michigan State University. He is currently Associate Professor of Sociology at Rhodes University. One of South Africa's foremost social commentators, Desai's previous books include (amongst others) We are the poors: Community struggles in post-apartheid South Africa and Monty Naicker: Between Reason and Treason.

Goolam Vahed is Associate Professor in the Department of Historical Studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He holds a PhD in History from Indiana University (Bloomington, USA) and has taught widely in the fields of African, American and World history. His research interests include transnational history, religion, culture and ethnicity, as well as sprort and history. His previous books include Blacks in Whites: a Century of Cricket Struggles in KwaZulu-Natal (with A. Desai, V.Padayachee and K. Reddy) and Dear Ahmedbhai, Dear Zuleikhabehn: the Letters of Zuleikha Mayat and Ahmed Kathrada (compiled with T.Waetjen).
Reviews
“Inspired research. Beautifully written. A captivating narrative.”
- Professor Fatima Meer, Anti-apartheid and Human Rights Activist

“Bold and imaginative writing characterised by what can only be called outstanding research.”
- Uma Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Professor of History, University of the Western Cape

“A very valuable contribution to the historiography of South Africa, that will be a reference for many years to come.”
- Bill Freund, Professor Emeritus, University of Kwa-Zulu Natal

“Eloquent, informative, sensitive and moving, Inside Indian Indenture is an unparalleled exploration of a world now vanished beyond recall: the world of Indian indenture in all its gruesome and maddening complexity. This
book is an achievement of singular importance unlikely to be surpassed in our time, and destined to find a permanent place in the scholarship on the subject.”
- Brij V Lal, Professor of Pacific and Asian History, Australian National University and General Editor of The Enclyclopedia of the Indian Diaspora

“The story of the global migration of Indian indentured labour is one of the most poignant and central narratives of the nineteenth century. That story, the subject of many new works, has never been told better than by Goolam Vahed and Ashwin Desai in Inside Indian Indenture . Focusing on South Africa, Vahed and Desai go far beneath the surface to reveal not only the brutalities of indenture but also the near heroic lives of those who made the passage from India and their descendants. Drawing on an unusually wide and impressive array of sources, this book is remarkable for the depth of its insights, the empathy with which it casts an eye on indentured laborers, and the richness of its historiographic contribution.”
- Vinay Lal, Professor of History, Delhi University & University of California, Los Angeles

“These pages are replete with engaging story after engaging story of disillusionment and despair, of complicity and stark survival, but also of resistance, agency and triumph. The narratives are rendered in the most compelling prose, indisputably displaying how ideas and feelings meld in passionate scholarship.”
- Devarakshanam Govinden, Senior Research Associate, Faculty of Education, University of KwaZulu-Natal

The Families that are featured in Muslim Portraits:
FARID AHMED ADAMS
FEROZA ADAMS
AMEEN AKHALWAYA
CASSIM AMRA
ABDUL KADER ASMAL
MOHAMED SULEMAN ASMAL
ZAINAB ASVAT
OMAR BADSHA
AHMED BHOOLA
AMINA CACHALIA
AZHAR CACHALIA
ISMAIL MOHAMED "MOULVI" CACHALIA
YUSUF CACHALIA
AMEEN MAHOMED CAJEE
YUNUS CARRIM
ACHMAT CASSIEM
ZULEIKA SAROJINI CHRISTOPHER
HOOSEN MAHOED "JERRY" COOVADIA
YUSUF MOHAMED DADOO
AYESHA DAWOOD
AMINA DESAI
BARNEY DESAI
ABDUL KHALEK MOHAMED DOCRAT
EBRAHIM EBRAHIM
AHMED GORA EBRAHIM
FARID ESACK
SULIMAN MOOSA ESAKJEE
ABDOOL KARRIM ESSACK
OMAR ESSACK
ALLIE FATAAR
CISSIE GOOL
GOOLAM GOOL
HAWA HALIMA GOOL
JANUB GOOL
HOOSEN MIA HAFFEJEE
IMAM ABDULLAH HARON
KADER HASSIM
NINA HASSIM
HASSEN HOWA
MOHAMMED ABDULHAI ISMAIL
ABOOBAKER RASHID ISMAIL
ZUBEIDA JAFFER
ABDULHAY JASSAT
AHMED MOHAMED KATHRADA
AHMED I. LIMBADA
HASSEN MALL
FAROUK MEER
FATIMA MEER
ISMAIL CHOTA MEER
ISMAIL MOHAMED "MOULVI" CACHALIA
SAYED IQBAL MOHAMED
YUNUS MOHAMED
IQBAL SHAIK MOHAMMED
MOSI MOOLLA
MOHAMMED VALI MOOSA
SHAIKH HASSAN MOWLA
ABDULLAJ MAHOMED "DULLAH" OMAR
RASHIED OMAR
AZIZ GOOLAM PAHAD
ESSOP GOOLAM PAHAD
GOOLAM HOOSEN ISMAIL PAHAD
NALEDI MANDISA PANDOR
EBRAHIM RASOOL
MOHAMMED RAFIQ ROHAN
AHMED HOOSEN SADER
SULIMAN "BABLA" SALOOJEE
EBRAHIM CASSIM SALOOJEE
DAWOOD SEEDAT
FATIMA SEEDAT
MO SHAIK
YUNUS SHAIKH
AHMED TIMOL
ISMAIL VADI
YUSUF VAWDA

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Bank:                            Albaraka Bank
Branch:                         Durban
Account No:                 508 130 4601

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