Why were 80,000 Asians suddenly expelled from Uganda in 1972?

The mantelpieces of many an Asian family in Leicester and London, it is said, sport two framed photographs. One is of Idi Amin, the African dictator who expelled them from Uganda; the other is of Edward Heath, the prime minister who allowed them in. ‘This double gratitude,’ writes Lucy Fulford, ‘says thanks for throwing us out and thanks for taking us in.’

If the expulsion from ‘the Pearl of Africa’ of 80,000 Asians was the most traumatic experience of their lives, many also retro-actively recognise it as the best thing that ever happened. It’s a juxtaposition explored in this detailed account of what ensued when Uganda’s quixotic despot gave an ethnic minority he accused of economic sabotage just 90 days to leave in 1972.

Last year marked the 50-year anniversary of this jarring episode, so this book lands a little late. But it is enriched by the author’s intimate family involvement. Her Indian grandparents were recruited in 1953 to teach in what was then the British protectorate of Uganda. Her mother was among those expelled to Britain, while she herself was born in Australia. The book is, among other things, an attempt to answer the question: Where, exactly, is home?

Fulford has put in the footwork, tracing the routes followed by businessmen, civil servants and middle managers from plantations and trading stations in Jinja, Gulu and Kampala, via refugee camps hurriedly created in former barracks, to new lives in Bristol, Leicester, London and beyond, since Canada and Australia also took in a share of the expellees.

The book is full of the sights, smells and tastes of what most remember as a lost utopia (what can be more evocative than recipes?) and peppered with intriguing nuggets.