Businessman with Gujarati roots helps Uganda scout for investments

Uganda currently has an estimated population of 35,000 persons of Indian origin (PIO), much lesser than the number of people who fled the country in the 1970s.

Sanjiv Ramanlal Patel Listen to this article Businessman with Gujarati roots helps Uganda scout for investments x 00:00 1x 1.5x 1.8x

“My family has lived for 100 years in Uganda,” says Sanjiv Ramanlal Patel as he introduces the East African nation to possible investors in Gujarat. Travelling with the Ugandan High Commission officials in India during a three-day roadshow, Patel – who has survived military dictator Idi Amin’s infamous regime as a seven-year-old – is currently scouting for investments in Gujarat for the country.

Based in Kampala, the capital of Uganda, Patel is the director of the Tomil Group of Companies, which includes entities in agriculture, real estate and logistics, and fireworks. “In search of new opportunities, my grandfather Jivabhai — as a 17-year-old — travelled in a dhow (a wooden Indian boat) across the sea and reached Uganda in around 1923 when India was still under the British rule. He hailed from Sisva village in Borsad which is part of Anand district in Gujarat,” Patel told The Indian Express during an interaction on the sidelines of the roadshow on Friday.

Patel’s grandparents used to live in a remote area near the Uganda-Kenya border. The family flourished after setting up a maize flour mill and a textile mill. “It was the only textile mill in the whole of East Africa and was called African Textile Mill. Then, in 1972, dictator Idi Amin threw Indians out of the country. He thought we were stealing from locals and from the country. We were given only 90 days to vacate Uganda. Our business and house were taken over by the government. I was just seven then,” said Patel, remembering how his father Ramanlal — who was slated to be arrested — escaped narrowly as he was visiting India in connection with his business.

Rest of his family members, including grandparents, uncles, and aunts returned to India. Some of them later migrated to the United Kingdom.

The family spent almost 17 years in India. During this period, Patel did his schooling at Rosary School in Vadodara and then graduated from Maharaja SayajiRao University. “It was only after 1986 when Yoweri Museveni (current President of Uganda) took over and started inviting Indians back, that my father returned to Uganda. Our textile mill and house were returned to us,” says Patel. But this time, upon return, the family chose the country’s capital Kampala — which also had an airport –to settle down.

Patel who had migrated to Delaware, United States, and had opened a liquor store returned to Uganda in 1992 to be closer to his family. “We practically started from scratch a second time. The business, however, expanded to paint, coffee production, real-estate and insurance.

Today the business environment is a lot better than what it was during the 1970s. The country is expected to grow at 6.5 per cent this year. This is a huge growth for a small country like ours,” Patel said.

Uganda currently has an estimated population of 35,000 persons of Indian origin (PIO), much lesser than the number of people who fled the country in the 1970s.