There was a huge indian influence in burma also so this could be part of what inspired this
Control of Assam, Manipur, Arakan and the Tennasserim was granted to Calcutta after the first Anglo-Burmese war,
After the second Anglo-Burmese war (1852-53) Britain annexed Lower Burma and made it a province of India.
In "AN AUSTRALIAN IN CHINA
BEING THE NARRATIVE OF A QUIET JOURNEY ACROSS CHINA TO BURMA"
BY
GEORGE ERNEST MORRISON, 1902
he says
"There is a wonderful mixture of types in Bhamo. Nowhere in the world, not even in Macao, is there a greater intermingling of races. Here live in cheerful promiscuity Britishers and Chinese, Shans and Kachins, Sikhs and Madrasis, Punjabis, Arabs, German Jews and French adventurers, American missionaries and Japanese ladies."
Wikipedia said this ( and yes I always look on that source as being of mixed use )
"British Rangoon was heavily populated by Burmese Indians in British colonial times constituting 53% in Rangoon alone at its peak (c. 1930). The Burmese dubbed the city kala myo (Indian town) and even the Bamar and the Chinese residents of Yangon learnt to speak Hindi."
In a tread elsewhere on an Indian sword carried by a burmese Ian said
"There is no doubt that in the early 19th C. the Burmese viewed neighboring areas of India as their sovereign territory, extending as far as Assam. "
Couldn't all this be why we see this mix in the picture ?
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