Ekaterina O. Astashina

After arriving to India as a part of French East India Company mission and becoming de facto head of all French settlements in Asia, François Martin (1634–1706) chose a place for a future commercial post on the Hindustan peninsula coast, concluded agreements with local rulers concerning the ownership of this territory, and founded a settlement, which subsequently began to attract thousands of Frenchmen. Among them were both the trading company employees and ordinary people willing to shift from cold Europe to comfortable tropics. As a result, Pondicherry turned into the most famous French colony in India, and François Martin’s name became part of the history of French colonialism. Throughout 30 years of his service for the French East India Company, François Martin was keeping a diary; after more than two centuries, in 1931, it was published in France as a three-volume edition. In his ‘Mémoires’ Martin introduces in detail the milestones of establishing the French trade system, the sea voyages to Madagascar and further to Asia, discusses the performance of other European companies in Hindustan, describes local princely states and their interaction, and presents his assessment of the achievements of the French on the peninsula. Based on primary sources that have never been used by Russian Indologists, the article focusses on the role of François Martin in setting up strategically important French territories in South Asia at the turn of the XVIII century.

In 1954, in the village of Kizhur at the border of Pondicherry and Madras (since 1956 - Tamil Nadu) a referendum took place; it was attended by representatives of the local Pondicherry elite who took a decision on the merger of the French colonial possessions in the South of Hindustan with India. The decision to transfer the territories brought about a number of legal issues that were to be resolved by the governments of the two countries; the issue of citizenship of Pondicherry residents was one of them. In 1956, India and France signed a final agreement that determined the new status of former French enclaves and the legal status of their residents. The article examines the key provisions of the 1956 agreement on the transfer of territories to India, regulatory inconsistencies in the articles on citizenship, as well as formal difficulties that the residents of Pondicherry could have encountered. It also analyzes the current status of Pondicherry residents - those of French or other foreign citizenship.

After gaining independence from Great Britain in 1947, the territory of Hindustan still encompassed small colonial enclaves — French and Portuguese. The issue of their joining India was a matter of time. French possessions included Chandernagore in Bengal; Pondicherry, Yanaon and Karikal on the east coast; and Mahe on the west coast. Population of the French-owned territories was basically represented by Bengalis, Tamils and Malayalis; their ethnic identity played a decisive role in the integration of the former French possessions into the Republic of India. This article examines the stages and ethnocultural nuances of the integration process.