1) Sudan’s
first national flag was actually “created” in April 1955 at the
Bandung (Indonesia) Conference of Africa and Asia by Indian’s first
Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru? Since Sudan was still not
independent, Nehru wrote out Sudan on his white handkerchief and put
it on the table
The Sudanese delegation at Bandung in April 1955 with Sudan's
first Flag
2)
Apedemak, the God of War of the
ancient Kush kingdom of Sudan, just south of the
first Nile cataract (modern Aswan) is depicted in the famous temples
of Naqa (30 km east of the Nile) as a triple headed god emerging
from a lotus a clear indication of Indian influence through the
ancient Red Sea port of Adulis!
3) By the end of the 12th
century, the Nubian kingdoms of northern Sudan were trading with
India
4)
In the 18th
century, Indian merchants regularly visited the major market town of
Shendi, northeast of Khartoum to buy leather, gold, wood and animals
(camels and horses) from the south
5) The pastoral Beja, some 5% of Sudan’s
population, and one of Sudan’s oldest groups, immortalized for their
martial spirit by Rudyard Kipling as the “fuzzy wuzzies”, claim
origin from India.
6) Two famous steel suspension rail
bridges in Khartoum and Atbara were imported from India in the first
decade of the last century and are still in use.
7) In 1935, Mahatma Gandhi stopped over in
Port Sudan (on his way to England by boat) and was welcomed by the
Indian community there
8)
In 1938, Pandit Jawaharlal
Nehru and his daughter also stopped over in Port Sudan on his way to
Britain and attended a function at the home of Chhotalal Samji
Virani.
9) The
first Sudanese Parliamentary elections in 1953 were supervised by
the Sukumar Sen, Chief Election Commissioner of India
10) India
provided financial support to compensate the British civil servants
replaced by the Sudanization Committee in 1954-55
11) Some
30,000 Sudanese have studied in India
12) There is
clear evidence of a Ganesh Cult in the Kush kingdom based in Meroe from the 3rd century BC
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