The nephew of J. N. Tata, Shapurji Saklatvala travelled to England in 1905 to recuperate from malaria and to manage the Tata company office in Manchester. He married Sarah Marsh in 1907 (a waitress he had met at the hydro in Matlock where he had been treated). They moved to London in 1907 and Saklatvala joined the Independent Labour Party (ILP) in 1909. In 1921, Saklatvala was adopted as the Labour candidate for Battersea North, despite joining the Communist Party in the same year. In November 1922, he won the seat for Labour and was defeated in December 1923. He regained the seat in October 1924, when he stood as a Communist representative and held the seat until 1929. Saklatvala was the 3rd Asian to become an MP in Britain (all incidentally of Parsee background).

Saklatvala raised Indian issues in Parliament. He was a member of the Indian Home Rule League (founded in 1916). He was also a founder member of the Workers' Welfare League in 1917. This League was initially concerned with the working conditions of Indian seamen in London, but soon widened its objectives to improve the position of all types of Indian workers. He was an influential figure to Indian students in London in the 1920s and 1930s, but was banned from returning to India because of his Communist affiliations. He died in his home in London in January 1936 and was buried in the Parsee burial ground in Brockwood, Surrey.

Akbar Ali Khan came to Britain in the 1930s. He first stayed in London and found work as an extra in crowd scenes in empire films. He co-founded the Oriental Film Artistes’ Union with Surat Alley and acted as its President. In London, Akbar Ali Khan was involved with groups campaigning for Indian self-determination, such as the India League. He attended many meetings and spoke at the Indian independence rally at Conway Hall in January 1940.

He moved to Birmingham in 1940 and subsequently to Coventry, working as a labourer at the Daimler factory. Although his name suggests that he might be Muslim, the India Office thought that he might be Sikh. A memo on the Indian Workers' Union noted on 17 December 1942 that he ‘is...totally westernized and a Muhammedan in name only; he lives in a Sikh establishment’ (L/PJ/12/646). Khan was the president of the Indian Workers’ Association in Coventry. He was particularly interested in the political organization of Indians living in Britain and was instrumental in the Association’s expansion in the Midlands and northern England, helping to start up IWA branches in Wolverhampton, Newcastle and Manchester. He was also instrumental in helping to set up the IWA’s monthly bulletin, Indian Worker, published in Urdu.

Akbar Ali Khan actively campaigned against the compulsory conscription of Indians living in Britain during the Second World War. He resigned as President of the Central Committee of the Indian Workers' Association (Birmingham) in July 1943. The linking of the IWA and Swaraj House through the Federation of Indian Associations in Great Britain brought about the temporary retirement of Akbar Ali Khan from the political scene. He feared that the IWA might be taken over by Surat Alley. By 1945 Akbar Ali Khan was re-elected as IWA President and disengaged the IWA from the Federation of Indian Associations of Great Britain. He was also an active member of the Committee of Indian Congressmen and the Indian National Army Defence Committee.

Sastrya arrived in Britain in Spring 1936 to train as a journalist. In December 1936 he approached the India League to offer his support for as long as he remained in the UK. According to India Office Records, Sastrya had found it difficult to find work as a journalist in the English Press. He worked for a while for the Orient Press Service and supplemented his income by working in the Indian Stores department. He later moved to the Midlands to take up work with Albert Herberts Ltd. in Coventry. He studied economics in evening classes and completed his course in July 1940. In 1941, he was working as a shop steward for Daimler and later as an Inspector in the Gauge Control Department of the BSA Works in Birmingham.

Sastrya was a committed socialist and was a driving force in organizing Indian workers in the Midlands. He was actively involved with the Indian Workers Association and became its secretary in October 1941. He drafted a constitution for the IWA and was instrumental in helping the IWA expand by setting up a central committee functioning from Birmingham with branches in Coventry, Bradford, Newcastle, Sheffield, Manchester and other towns and cities with large Indian communities in the UK. He also helped to set up a newsletter which was published in both English and Urdu. In order to pursue his work for the IWA more effectively he resigned from his BSA job on grounds of ill-health.

Sastrya was committed to protecting the interests of Indian workers in the UK, working with great enthusiasm and making full use of his organizational skills. He was a driving force for the expansion of the organization. He campaigned for Indian independence and was of the opinion that Indians had to publicize the cause of Indian independence not only to an Indian audience in Britain but amongst all people living in the UK. Sastrya’s work was instrumental in politicizing the Indian community living and working in the Midlands at the time.

He was employed by the Socialist Appeal, a Trotskyist journal, and was also a member of the Independent Labour Party. In 1944 he went on a tour to speak at a series of ‘Quit India’ demonstrations held in Birmingham, Coventry, Bradford, Leeds, Manchester and Newcastle. Sastrya also worked closely with Surat Alley as part of the Federation of Indian Associations in Great Britain. He lost his position as secretary of the organization when Akbar Ali Khan became its president in 1945 and pursued a policy of disengaging the IWA from the Federation of Indian Associations in Great Britain.