Sweet Malida is a deeply moving and sensory offering. It gives readers an intimate look into the world of the Bene Israel, a small but ancient community in India. Zilka Joseph pays tribute to her growing up as a Jew in Mumbai and Kolkata, two very multicultural cities. Her childhood memories are intertwined with the ancestral memories of the Bene Israel, the oldest Jewish community in India. The first section of the book orients the reader to the Bene Israel community—their arrival, signifiers of their Jewishness and their traditions that are so melded with those of India. The date of their arrival on the Konkan coast is unsettled. She explains: ‘One theory of their arrival is that two ships from the Middle East were shipwrecked on the West coast of India in 175 BCE… Others think they came after the destruction of the second temple in 70 CE, or that they were descendants of the Lost Tribes who came around the tenth century, perhaps around King Solomon’s reign. The most popular theory is that they were fleeing the rule of the Greek overlord Epiphanes in 175 BCE’ (p. 5). What we do know is that the villagers provided them food and shelter which Zilka poetically recalls in ‘The Angels of the Konkan’ (p. 14, and 15).
From tumbled sands and shattered bark
blurred shadows dragged us…
August 2025, volume 49, No 8