Caravans : Punjabi Khatri Merchants on the Silk Road

‘Fills many gaps in our knowledge of India’s vibrant business past . . . highlights India’s pervasive role in the Silk Road’—Business Standard Caravans tells the fascinating story of countless Punjabi Khatri merchants who built great business empires through their ingenuity and spirit of adventure. Operating during the sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries, these merchants risked everything and travelled across Afghanistan, Central Asia, Iran and Russia. They used sophisticated techniques to convert a modest amount of merchandise into vast portfolios for trade and moneylending ventures. Caravans challenges the belief that the rising tide of European trade in the Indian Ocean usurped the overland ‘Silk Road’ trade, and demonstrates how thousands of Punjabis created a booming market in Central Asia at precisely this historical moment.