The geographic locus of today's program is Gujarat.
Mr Yadubir Singh Rawat who has done extensive research on Harappan sites in Gujarat speaks on 'Harappan Coastal Settlements in Gujarat and Their Maritime Connections'. taking Indian maritime history way back in time.
Dr Chhaya Goswami then fast-forwards us a couple of millennia as she extols the entrepreneurial spirit of the "Merchants of Khachch in Arabia and East Africa" as they thrive on global trade well before the word globalisation was even invented.
Sri Yadubir Singh Rawat is the former Director, Gujarat State Archaeology & Museum, Government of Gujarat (2001-15), Competent Authority Gujarat, Under National Monument Authority, Govt. of India and the Director In Charge, Gujarat State Archives Government of Gujarat. He has also served as the CEO of the Vadnagar Heritage Society. He has participated in archaeological excavations in over a dozen sites, including Dholavira and Vadnagar. He has carried out the conservation of a large number of State Protected Monuments in Gujarat and published several papers and articles in reputed journals.
Dr Chhaya Goswami specializes in the maritime history of the west coast of India and the western Indian Ocean, with a focus on trans-regional and trans-oceanic commodity exchange, maritime trading networks, diaspora and community studies, business history, oral history and violence at sea. She is the author of The Call of the Sea, Kachchhi Traders in Muscat and Zanzibar c.1800-1880 and Globalization Before its Time: Gujarati Merchants from Kachchh. She has co-edited a volume with professor Edward Alpers- titled Transregional Trade and Traders: Situating Gujarat in the Indian Ocean (Oxford University Press- 2018). She has won awards from the Indian History Congress for her book and also for two research papers. She was an honorary University Fellow at Exeter University and a post-doctoral fellow with Warwick University. Currently, she is the head and assistant professor at the Department of History, S K Somaiya college, University of Mumbai.