As Prime Minister Modi lands in Mauritius, why the island country matters to India

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be in Mauritius Tuesday for a two-day State visit, his second since 2015. He will be the Chief Guest at Mauritius' National Day Celebrations on March 12. Mauritius, a strategically located island nation in the western Indian Ocean, is an important neighbour for India. A key reason for the special ties is that people of Indian-origin comprise nearly 70% of the island's population of 1.2 million. Mauritius was once a French colony, before being taken over by the British. Under the nearly century-long French rule (in the 1700s), Indians were first brought to Mauritius from…