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Episode 1: Bangalore

Bangalore

BBC Radio 4 - Home from Home, Bangalore

Hardeep Singh Kohli meets British Indians who have left the UK for a new life in India.

The tiger economy of India has encouraged British Indians to leave the UK and make the reverse trip to the subcontinent. Hardeep Singh Kohli talks to them in Bangalore and Mumbai.

As India's economy has boomed, many British Indians - born or brought up in the UK to immigrant Indian parents - have been encouraged to make the reverse journey. In two programmes Hardeep Singh Kohli visits the busy centres of Bangalore and Mumbai and tracks down some of those who have decided to change their lives and make a go of it in India. But do they see themselves as Indian or British? What do they relish and what do they miss?

In the first programme Hardeep is in Bangalore - centre for IT, finance and outsourcing - where he meets is Nina Bual. She arrived in India on a one-way ticket, having become fed up with her PR job in London. Now she is a successful entrepreneur running four spas. The second returnee decided on an unlikely venture - to open a French patisserie with his French wife. This is Shashi Halai from Finchley and together they have expanded their business to pizzas and quiches - and not a curry in sight. 

Many of the returnees work for major international companies, who find Bangalore offers the chance to expand into the huge Indian market. One of these is Rajiv Sagar. His wife gave up her UK job and they and their 2 children moved to one of the prestige gated communities. Once past security you enter a world of manicured lawns and ordered comings and goings - totally unlike the rest of the heaving city. The Sagar's will eventually be moving back, but that's not the case for Sati and Priti Joshi who have put down firm roots, bought a house, and committed themselves - but adapting to life in India is not easy, and the ever-present custom of bribes, is something they fight against


Producer: Richard Bannerman
A Ladbroke Production for BBC Radio 4.

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Hardeep Singh Kohli meets British Indians who have left the UK for a new life in India

Hardeep Singh Kohli meets British Indians who have left the UK for a new life in India, encouraged by its tiger economy

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