with Vedica Kant & Robert Upton

hosted by Chris Gratien





During World War I, over 600,000 troops from South Asia were part of the British army's invasion of Ottoman Iraq. Thousands were taken prisoner in this campaign and became part of a larger story that is the tragedy of the First World War, witnessing and sharing the plight of deported Armenians as they marched across Anatolia. In this podcast, Vedica Kant talks about the experience of Indian POWs in the Ottoman Empire as well as that of Ottoman soldiers captured by the British army and brought to India and Burma, with additional commentary by Robert Upton regarding military recruitment in British India and the complex relationship between imperialism, war, and nationalism for Indian intellectuals of the period.

Note for the listener: This podcast is based on primary source research. It also makes use of publicly available information and draws from the following works below, which are also mentioned during the course of the episode.

For the purposes of academic citation

, we encourage you to consult these works as well.

Indian Troops Manning Lewis Gun on Mesopotamian Front, 1918

Source: Imperial War Museum Photographic Archive

Indian military engineers in Mesopotamia, World War I

Source: Imperial War Museum Photographic Archive

Moslem Indian Guard at the Mosque of Omar [Dome of the Rock], 1917

Source: Library of Congress

Indian cavalry passing through Haifa following the city's capture, 1918

Source: Imperial War Museum Photographic Archive

Indian Troops at Gas Mask Drill, World War I

Source: Imperial War Museum Photographic Archive





Wounded Indian Soldier on Western Front, World War I

Source: Imperial War Museum Photographic Archive

Indian soldiers at Rufiji, German East Africa, 1916

Source: Imperial War Museum Photographic Archive

Ottoman Prisoners of War in Bellary, India, 1916

Soruce: 7/24 Magazin

Ottoman Prisoners of War in Burma, World War I

Source: Vedica Kant

Letter from Ottoman prisoner of war in Burma to wife in Istanbul, 1916

Source: K-Haber





Episode No. 86Release date: 28 December 2012Location: Feriköy, IstanbulEditing and production by Chris GratienImages and bibliography courtesy of Vedica KantSantanu Das (ed.),(New York: Cambridge. University Press, 2011)David Omissi,(Palgrave, 1999)Cemalettin Taşkıran,(İş Bankası Yayınları, 2011)S. D. Pradhan, ‘Indian Army and the First World War’ in DeWitt C. Ellinwood and S. D. Pradhan,(New Delhi, Manohar, 1978).Briton Cooper Busch,(University of. California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London, 1971)(Calcutta, Government of India, 1923)