In 1961, a full 14 years after much of the rest of the subcontinent had been freed from British rule, the Indian armed forces marched into Goa to dislodge the Portuguese from the tiny, palm-fringed territory the European power had held for 451 years.

That was the longest period of European colonialism anywhere in the world and it marked the beginning of the end for the Portuguese empire. The struggle for freedom in the Lusitanian colonies of Angola and Mozambique picked up pace after that.