Ayush:
My name is Ayush, and I am ten years old and I live in Leicester. My family comes from Uganda in Africa. I've come to see Rupal whose family also come from Uganda. Rupal is a radio DJ and she's going to tell me about how her family was forced to leave Uganda and move to Leicester when she was just 2 years old. India and Uganda both used to be ruled by Britain, so people would sometimes move between the two countries to find work. Sometimes workers were treated badly and not paid properly.
In 1962, Uganda stopped being ruled by Britain and by 1972, it was ruled by a man called Idi Amin. Idi Amin ordered all Indian peopleliving in Uganda to leave. 50,000 people were forced to move and a lot of these people ended up coming to Britain because Uganda used tobe part of the British Empire. So, how did you first come to Leicester Rupal?
Rupal:
When my dad was a teenager, he moved from India to Uganda because there were lots of job opportunities for him and there wasn't much in India. So he moved to Uganda in the 1940s and he met my mum, got married, he had 4 children and I'm one of the youngest. He was workingon a massive sugar plantation and that was until about 1972, when things changed completely. We were asked to leave and we decided to come to Leicester
Ayush:
Why was your family forced to leave Uganda?
Rupal:
A dictator by the name of Idi Amin took over the country and one of the first things he wanted to do was to get rid of all the Asiansbecause he felt that we were taking all the wealth from the country. He called it, 'milking the economy.' He gave us 90 days to leave the country. Around 50 to 60,000 Asians who run a lot of the businesses there left to go to various parts of the world. But a lot came to Britain. We were only allowed to bring a suitcase full of clothes and £50 per family, from what I understand, so that's all we came to the UK with.
Ayush:
So how did you end up in Leicester?
Rupal:
A lot of us had British passports, including my parents. So one of the places we were thinking of coming, well, my parents thought of coming was to Britain and here in Leicester, the local council, the city council took out an advert in the Ugandan newspaper and asked us Asians not to come to Leicester because they said they didn't have the facilities and because so many of us had heard of Leicester, a lot of people came here. So it sort of backfired on the council a little bit.
Ayush:
So what were your earliest memories of Leicester, Rupal?
Rupal:
I remember my mum taking me to school for the very first day and me being terrified. She was dressed in her normal outfit,which was a sari. I remember tugging on her sari to say, 'Please don't leave me here, don't leave me here.' I was really, really scared.
Ayush:
How long did it take for you and your family to get used to life in Britain?
Rupal:
It's taken a long time, I think, for all of us. But because there was a lot of us, a lot of Ugandan Asians, we all helped each other.We all supported each other and it felt like a real community. And there were lots of people from Leicester as well that helped us and supported us and made us feel welcome.
Ayush:
How did you become a radio DJ then?
Rupal:
Purely by accident, if I'm really honest. One day, I heard an advert on the radio and I thought, 'Let me, let me seeif I could get a job there.' So I applied. And I started from scratch, making tea and coffee and made my way up.
Ayuash:
So how do you feel about what happened to you and your family?
Rupal:
We were thrown out of the country. People had to start life all over again from scratch with nothing. Me, my family and thousands of other Ugandan Asians will be marking the 50th anniversary, and I want people never, really to forget. Rupal's family and my familyexperienced the same difficult journey when they were both forced to leave Uganda and come to Britain.
Ayush:
But it was uplifting to speak to Rupal and find out how she has created a successful life in the UK since then. My parents and grandparents have also worked hard to make a good life for me here in Leicester and I'm very grateful to them.
Video summary
Radio DJ Rupal Rajani talks to 10-year-old Ayush about how Asian people living in Uganda in the 1970's were forced to leave by the Ugandan President Idi Amin.
Rupal and Ayush discuss how Idi Amin ordered all Asians to leave Uganda, because he felt that they were taking wealth from the country. Many of these displaced people came to Britain, with only a suitcase full of clothes and £50 per family.
Rupal talks about the fear she felt on her first day at her new school in Leicester, but because there was a lot of Ugandan Asians, they all supported each other and it felt like a real community.
This short film is from the BBC Teach series British Asian History.
Teacher Notes
Learning points
- To learn about the reasons why people have emigrated to Britain from Asia over time.
- To learn the effects of India becoming independent from Britain in 1947, just after WW2.
- To understand the idea of the “dual identity” of people who migrate from one country and settle in another.
- To learn about the idea of a “double migration” – people migrating from one country to another, and then migrating from there to a different country.
Key Vocabulary
This film gives you the chance to explore and learn this vocabulary in the context of a personal story.
Vocabulary used in the film:
- Ruled
- Possessions
- Dictator
- Migrants
- British Empire
- Opportunity
- Anniversary
Vocabulary useful for discussing the film:
- Immigration and immigrants - coming to live permanently in another country.
- Emigration - leaving one's own country in order to settle permanently in another.
- Asia/Asian - the largest and most populous continent on earth.
- Britain/ British - "Great Britain" is often used to refer to England, Scotland and Wales, including their component adjoining islands.Great Britain and Northern Ireland now constitute the United Kingdom.
- Community - a group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common.
- Culture - a pattern of behaviour shared by a society, or group of people.
- Discrimination - the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people.
- Diversity - differences in racial and ethnic, socioeconomic, geographic and academic backgrounds.
- Equality - when people are treated the same, regardless of what they look like or where they come from.
- Inclusion - being a part of what everyone else is, being welcomed and embraced as a member who belongs.
- Legacy - something we inherit from past generations and pass to our future generations.
- Prejudice - a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience.
- Racism - the belief that people of different races or ethnic groups have different value in society, and using this against them.
Before watching the film
You may want to discuss what your pupils understand by the word ‘immigrant’ and what they already know about people who have come to live in the UK, over time. Pupils could discuss what they understand by the term ‘community’ and whether they identify as being part of any communities.
In the film, our interviewer explains that India was no longer ruled by Britain after 1947. You could make links with the children’s prior knowledge of the British Empire, the Victorian Era and the post-war years following World War Two.
Please note, the film refers to Idi Amin and how he ordered Indian people living in Uganda to leave. You should consider the needs of any children in your class with Ugandan or Indian heritage, or who have lived experience of being displaced or having to leave a country under distressing circumstances, as part of your preparation.
Questions to consider
Depending on the focus of your lesson, you may wish to pause the short film at certain points to check for understanding, asking questions such as:
- Why did some people emigrate from India to settle in the Uganda? Why did Rupal’s family come to live in Leicester?
- How do you think Rupal’s family felt when they had to leave Uganda?
- Rupal’s family could take very few possessions with them. What do you think they might have taken in their suitcase?
- Why do you think Rupal was so terrified on her first day of school? How does this compare with how you felt starting school/joining a new school?
- How did people from Leicester treat Rupal and her family?
- Why do you think having a community around them helped Rupal’s family?
- Why do you think Rupal doesn’t want Ugandan Asians to forget what happened when their families had to leave Uganda 50 years ago?
Activities to further explore learning
- Pupils could compare and contrast this episode with the Moey Hassan episode.
- Pupils could discuss how our British Values were or were not enacted in Rupal’s story. For example, how was tolerance or intolerance a part of this film?
- Having watched the film, pupils could write down any questions they would ask Rupal if they had the opportunity.
How this film meets the aims of the National Curriculum in England:
- History
This film will help you to ensure your pupils understand the history of these places as a coherent, chronological narrative, focusing on the 19th Century to the present day. Through this personal story, pupils will learn about the diversity of people who have shaped this nation and how Britain has influenced and been influenced by the wider world.
Pupils will develop deeper understanding of historical concepts such as continuity and change, cause and consequence, similarity, difference and significance, and use them to make connections, draw contrasts, analyse trends, and frame historically-valid questions.
They will also gain historical perspective by placing their growing knowledge into different contexts, understanding the connections between local, regional, national and international history; between cultural, economic, military, political, religious and social history; and between short- and long-term timescales.
How this film meets the aims of the Scottish Curriculum:
Social Studies
This film will enable pupils to compare and contrast communities and the lives of people in the past with their own, and to contribute to a discussion of the similarities and differences.They will find out why people and events from a particular time in the past were important, placing them within a historical sequence.
Health and Welbeing Across the Curriculum
This film will help pupils to develop self-awareness, self-worth and respect for others, understanding diversity and that it is everyone’s responsibility to challenge discrimination.
How this film meets the aims of the The Northern Ireland Curriculum:
- The World Around Us
This film will enable pupils to learn about how people and places have changed over time, the causes and effects of people moving from one place to another, and the positive and negative impacts of people on places. Exploring the lives and memories of people from the past is part of the history non-statutory guidance and this film provides an ideal starting point for this.
- Personal Development
This film will enable pupils to appreciate the similarities and differences between themselves and others by providing a starting point for discussing cultural heritage, community and the diversity of people living in Britain.
How this film meets the aims of the National Curriculum in Wales:
History
This film will enable pupils to place events chronologically, identify similarities and differences between ways of life in different places during the 20th Century, and to discuss the consequences to people of historic events.Personal and Social Education Framework
This film will help pupils to see people who have been active citizen and help them to develop respect for others. Through personal stories, pupils will learn the value of diversity and recognise the importance of equality of opportunity.
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