(This article originally appeared in The Print on May 26, 2022)
- On a January morning in 1698, a ship carrying goods from Bandar Abbas in Safavid Persia arrived at the bustling port of Surat. Among the passengers were Indians, Persians and a small group of men who became the first Russians to reach the shores of western India since Afanasy Nikitin arrived in Chaul in the 15th century…