A free family research tool · South Africa
Follow the number back to the ship.
Girmit follows the colonial registration number on an old certificate back to a ship, a district and a village in India. It is built for South African families preparing an OCI application, and the family tree is free.
A number from an old birth record
Hover over, tap or tab to a part of the number to see what it means.
- Generation 1 · born in India903 · Lord George Bentinck, 1860314 · a second India-born grandparent
- Generation 2 · born in the colonyThe parent named on the record21247
- Generation 3 · the birth recordReads 21247/903/314
Worked example built into the tool. Sample family, invented.
Girmit in about a minute
See how it works.
Captions are on the video, with soft background music, so you may want to turn your volume down before you press play. The family in it is a sample, and the people are invented.
Read what the video says
Many South African families came from India by ship, between 1860 and 1911. Type the colonial number from an old certificate, and Girmit explains what each part tells you. Follow it back to a ship, a district and a village in India.
Build your family tree, and share a branch with relatives when you are ready. Next to the tree, keep your family’s stories in one private place. Add the old photos, and tap a face to say who it is. Record a voice or a video, and type up what was said. Ask the whole family one question, and relatives answer from wherever they are. Turn it all into a keepsake book, in the look you like, with old-world sepia if you want it.
The family tree is free, with written stories, up to 100 photos and the timeline. The Family plan is R199 a year for the whole family: voice and video, questions and the keepsake book.
What’s free
The tree, the eligibility check and the dossier stay free. Voice and video in Family Stories come with the Family plan: R199 a year for the whole family.
Who can see it
Your tree is saved to your own account, encrypted. Nobody else in the family can see it, and there is no tracking inside the tool.
Your information
Save your whole tree as a file you own, or delete your account and everything in it yourself, at any time.
Please note: Girmit is not a lawyer, not an immigration agent and not part of the Indian government. It submits nothing for you and cannot guarantee approval.
Why now
Seven generations, and proof for every one.
In late 2025, India extended OCI eligibility to South African descendants of the indentured labourers who arrived between 1860 and 1911, going back seven generations instead of four. That means almost every South African family of Indian descent can now apply, including people who could not before.
But the Indian High Commission does not just want you to say you are of Indian descent. It wants you to prove it, generation by generation, with real documents. Gathering that evidence, in the right order, without missing a generation, is hard work. Girmit exists to make that part easier.
By descent
An ancestor arrived from India between 1860 and 1911. Open to seven generations.
By marriage
Married to an Indian citizen or an OCI cardholder. Registered, two years or more.
The Crossing · 1860–1911
A number points to a ship. The ship points to a family.
Scroll to follow the line from the Indian ports to Port Natal, and on to the estate and the address.
1860 · The first ship
The Truro reaches Port Natal
The Truro docked at Port Natal on 16 November 1860. Ships sailed from Madras and Calcutta carrying people recruited in the Tamil and Telugu south and on the Gangetic plains, bound by contract to the sugar estates of Natal.
The line on the map is only a sketch. Every voyage was different, but they all ended at the same harbour.
1860 to 1911 · 384 voyages
Fifty-one years of sailings
Recruitment to Natal ran from 1860 to 1911, across 384 voyages. 152,184 people arrived.
Each voyage left a ship’s list, and the names in it were spelled by ear.
On arrival · a number
A person became a number
Each person was registered on arrival and given a colonial number. Later birth registers list a child’s parents by those numbers. A single number means that parent was born in India. A compound number such as 21247/903/314 means the parent was born in the colony, and the numbers after the first lead back a generation.
Girmit reads these for you and says which ancestor each part points to.
After the contract · the estate
The ship, the estate, the address
The contract bound a labourer to five years on a named estate. What followed was not in it: where people could buy or were given land they farmed it, and where they could not they traded, taught and organised. The Natal Indian Congress was founded in 1894.
Your family’s address today is where this line ends, and where your paperwork starts.
What Girmit does
Six things, in the order you need them.
Organises your tree
Keep a simple record of each ancestor: their name, the number they were given on arrival, their parents, and where they were born.
Checks your eligibility
Traces your family line backwards and shows exactly which relatives make up your chain back to an ancestor born in India.
Decodes old numbers
Reads multi-part numbers like 21247/903/314 from old birth records and explains which ancestor each part points to.
Finds your gaps
Compares your evidence to what the High Commission asks for, person by person, and tells you what is missing.
Builds your dossier
Generates a printable family tree and evidence schedule, ready to take to your Consulate appointment.
Suggests spellings
Old ship’s records were spelled by ear. Girmit suggests likely variants so you can search old registers properly.
Your privacy
Your family’s information stays yours.
The tool is here to help you organise what your family already knows. You use it signed in to a free account, and what you put in is private to you.
Your tree
Saves as you type, to your browser and to your account, so you can carry on from another phone or computer. Deleting the account deletes it.
Your documents
Scans and photos of certificates are kept in your account only. Your tree and documents are stored encrypted and opened only when you view them signed in.
You can stop and come back
There is no save button because none is needed. Close the tab, come back next month, and it is all still there.
Start here
Start your family’s tree, free.
Making an account takes a minute. Your tree is private to you, and you share a branch only when you choose to. The tree, your account, written family stories and up to 100 photos are free. Voice and video come with the Family plan, R199 a year for the whole family.
Real family documents, with the family’s consent, will replace these illustrations as they come in.