The Lohana Community of United Kingdom is the national body of all UK Lohana Mahajans. We exist to hold sixteen communities together — promoting the cultural, religious, linguistic, educational and economic welfare of Lohanas across Britain.
A short Lohana Community UK history: how sixteen local Mahajans came together as one national body in 1978, and what LCUK does for the community today.
Most Lohana families in Britain arrived not directly from Gujarat but by way of East Africa. Through the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries Lohana traders and their families settled in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, building businesses, temples and community associations across the region.
From the late 1960s, and sharply after the 1972 expulsion from Uganda, thousands of those families came to Britain. They settled where work and relatives were — which is why Leicester, Harrow and north-west London still hold the largest Lohana populations in the country today.
Local Mahajans formed quickly, often around a hall, a temple or a handful of determined volunteers. By 1978 it was clear that those separate communities needed a national voice. LCUK was founded to be it.
LCUK is founded
The national body is established to bring the UK’s Lohana Mahajans together under one constitution and one voice.
The Mahajans grow
Local communities establish halls, youth groups, Gujarati schools and cultural programmes across the country.
The Sports Festival is revived
After a long gap, the festival returns — modest at first, with just two sports.
250+ entries, eight sports
Competitors from 9 to 85 years old. The festival becomes a fixture of the national calendar again.
The 38th Annual Delegates Conference
Held in Leicester in July, hosted by Shree Lohana Mahajan Leicester CIO, electing the 2026/27 Executive Committee and Board of Trustees.
Editor: this timeline has gaps we would like to fill — founding members, past presidents, and the milestones between 1978 and today. If you hold records or photographs, please get in touch.
Brings the Mahajans together
Sixteen member Mahajans send representatives to the Central Council. It is the one table where the whole UK Lohana community sits together.
Runs the national events
The Annual Delegates Conference and the Sports Festival — the two occasions each year that draw every Mahajan into one room, or onto one court.
Keeps the community connected
Bereavement notices, the eNewsletter, the cultural calendar and this website — the everyday communications that hold a dispersed community together.
Represents Lohanas nationally
LCUK speaks for the UK Lohana community and maintains links with Shree Lohana Mahaparishad and Lohana organisations worldwide.
The Lohana Community UK history begins long before 1978. Most Lohana families in Britain trace a journey that runs from Gujarat in western India, across the Indian Ocean to East Africa, and then to the United Kingdom through the 1960s and 1970s. They arrived as established traders, shopkeepers and professionals, and set about rebuilding the community life they had always kept: the temple, the hall, the festival and the extended family network.
By the late 1970s there were Lohana communities in cities across Britain, each organised but each on its own. LCUK was founded in 1978 to give that scattered community one constitution and one voice. The timeline above traces the story from there: the growth of the local Mahajans through the 1980s and 1990s, the revival of the Sports Festival in 2022, and the 38th Annual Delegates Conference held in Leicester in 2026.
Today LCUK is the national body of all sixteen UK Lohana Mahajans. It runs the two occasions that bring every Mahajan together each year, the Annual Delegates Conference and the Lohana Sports Festival, and it keeps a dispersed community connected through bereavement notices, the eNewsletter, the cultural calendar and this website. Its work still follows the aims set out in 1978: promoting the cultural, religious, social, linguistic and economic welfare of Lohanas in the United Kingdom.
LCUK is governed by three bodies working together. The Central Council is made up of representatives from all sixteen Mahajans. The Executive Committee runs the organisation day to day. The Board of Trustees holds it to account. The current officers were elected at the 2026 conference in Leicester. You can see the full Executive Committee and Trustees, and read how the governance structure fits together.
The UK community is one part of a global Lohana family, and LCUK maintains links with Shree Lohana Mahaparishad and Lohana organisations around the world. For background on the wider Lohana community, its origins in Gujarat and its spread through East Africa, see the overview on Wikipedia.
Our founding generation is now in their eighties. If you or someone in your family was part of the early years of LCUK or your local Mahajan, we would like to record what you remember — a phone call and half an hour is all it takes. Please get in touch.
