Banjara

by Shana Chandra

A powerful literary debut from an astonishing new Kiwi voice, focusing on the Indo-Fijian indenture system and how it affected generations across the Pacific.

Rajasthan 1888: Avani Rathod, a nomad of the Banjara community, is summoned to teach a blue-eyed colonial officer the trees of her region, but instead is misled into indenture to the sugarcane plantations of Fiji. While on the voyage that leads her away from her ancestral land, Avani's baby forms in her belly and she forges close friendships with the other women bound for the Pacific - bonds that will be tested once they reach the islands, under the suffocating colonial powers.

Aotearoa 2016: Avani's great-granddaughter, Meera Chand, seeks the true history of her ancestors - the forgotten and displaced Girmitiya. Meera's search for her great-grandmother's origins leads her to a region of India, where she learns the rhythms of Odissi dance and where she meets up with her former lover - the man she can never have, but whom she can't forget.

Set in Aotearoa, Australia, India and Fiji, Banjara is an essential reimagining of Indo-Fijian Girmitiya history, and a love letter to our ancestors whose stories live on in our genes.

314 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 14, 2026

Reviews

[Caeden]

i’m ashamed to say that i knew very little about the history of indentured servitude in Fiji so this was a very eye-opening book. a very thoughtful and well-written way of understanding the unique Indo-Fijian identity and how this period has continued to shape the South Pacific.