In a 1947 letter to the Cape Town Clerk, the secretary of the Board of Trustees to the Cape Peninsula Cemeteries requested the establishment of a new cemetery in Stikland, Cape Town. Later that year, the Cape Times reported that the new cemetery will provide adequate burial ground to accommodate the Cape Peninsula’s dead for about the next 200 years. The cemetery was estimated to be ready for use by October with lush trees and flowering shrubs as well as 10 different allotments each sub-divided into 46 plots and 312 graves accompanying it.

This island lies about 800 m from the mainland, it is located at the, northern entrance of Saldanha Bay in the Benguela current, which is an upwelling system. It is a small island, about 8.300 square kilometers. It is almost rectangular and fairly flat, with the highest point raising about 9 m above sea level. Parts of the island consist of smooth rock and big boulders, though there are patches of shallow soil, guano, sand and shell fragments.

Shirish was born one of eight siblings on 1 March 1938 at 51 Commercial Rd, Fordsburg. Jasmath Nanabhai, Shirish J. Nanabhai’s father, was from the village of Karadi/Matvad in Gujarat, India. Jasmath immigrated to South Africa after the turn of the last century. In a way, it was inevitable that Shirish would get involved in politics because Jasmath was active during his youth in the Indian National Congress, which had fought against British rule in India.