Essays tracing the presence of Jews in India compiled into two books -- "Jews and the Indian Art Project" and "Western Jews in India" have been launched here recently.
The books have been edited by Dr Kenneth Robbins and Rabbi Marvin Tokayer.
Robbins, a psychiatrist by profession says he set out with the aim to recognise the contribution of Jews in various fields in the country.
"My original goal was to do a book about the Jews in India, about the cultures of the various communities but that has been done many times. But what I found was that I kept on finding individual Jews who made contributions to India.
"I discovered that Jews have been coming to India for a long time now, they didn't all come at the one time, never came in great numbers," says Robbins.
He rattles off names of various Jews he has encountered through historical evidences and as physical people, narrating their stories as he goes along, establishing them more as individuals.
One of these people Robbins mentions is 'The Mother' (Mirra Alfassa), the spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo.
"She was a descendant of a Rabbi from North Africa whose family were Turkish Jews, came as rich Jews to Paris. She was an artist, came as a spiritual seeker to India and of course the history of her and Sri Aurobindo is known. I think we need to recognise her as an artist, as a Jew and her contribution in terms of India," says Robbins.
"Jews and the Indian Art Project," is a project by Robbins is an attempt to establish Jews as important and indispensable parts of the Indian art scene.
"If you look at any area of Indian art, you will find that there were Jews involved with it, in Bengal with the Tagores, Sir William Rothenstein was the person who introduced Tagore to the world and he was also the one who saved Vir Savarkar from being executed," shares the author.
