Now, with Mr. Amin's reign of terror long over, there are strong signs of an Asian revival here. Many, although not most, of the Asians that Mr. Amin expelled have picked up their lives in Uganda again. Their role in the country's economy rivals the influence they had in the 1970's that so infuriated the dictator.

Although they represent less than 1 percent of the country's population, Asians own Ugandan banks, hotels and foreign exchange bureaus. They manufacture soap, bicycles, jewelry and tissue paper. They run pharmacies, sell insurance and dominate the sugar industry.

There are an estimated 15,000 Asians living in Uganda today, far fewer than the 80,000 or so, mostly Indians and Pakistanis, during Mr. Amin's time. But estimates put the amount of investment that they have made in Uganda over the past decade at somewhere close to $1 billion.

These days, Uganda's richest men have names like Madhvani, Hirji and Ruparelia. Some of them contribute more in tax money than the combined populations of entire districts.

One of the tycoons is Sudhir Ruparelia, who was a child when Mr. Amin ordered Asians out. He stayed and today he owns a country club, various hotels and office buildings, an international school, a bank, an insurance company and a flower farm. His main office is a busy place full of many employees not only of Indian descent but with many black ones as well.

"You wouldn't be wrong to say 30 to 40 percent of the economy is in their hands," said Manuel Pinto, a former member of Uganda's Parliament whose father was an immigrant from Goa State in India and whose mother was a Ugandan. Such unions were, and continue to be, relatively rare, with Uganda's Indian community keeping largely to itself.

Syed A. H. Abidi still remembers hearing Idi Amin's booming voice on the radio as he ordered the Asians to get out within 90 days.

"We didn't believe it at first, but we soon realized that he meant what he said," said Mr. Abidi, who came to Uganda from India in 1971 to teach library science at Makerere University. "It was August 1972. I'll never forget it."

Mr. Abidi stayed beyond the Ugandan dictator's 90-day deadline, but eventually the climate of fear and terror of the Amin years proved too much for him. He resigned his position at the university in November 1973 and returned to New Dehli.

Now, three decades later, Mr. Abidi is back at Makerere, where he is at work on a book about the thousands of fellow Indians who have also returned.

Indians have a history in East Africa that goes back to the beginning of the 20th century, when Indian laborers were brought to the region by the British to build the railway line from Mombasa on the Kenyan coast to Kampala, the Ugandan capital. Back then, their biggest threat came from the lions that devoured workers and the diseases that killed them in large numbers as well.

Mr. Amin's ouster of the Asians backfired as his country's economy soon collapsed. Store shelves were empty. Inflation soared.

Still, the resentment that many black Ugandans felt toward Asians in the years after independence has not gone away. At the same time, Ugandan Asians say they feel welcome despite continued complaints about their economic clout.

"Generally, we're accepted here," said Murtuxa Dalal, an accountant who is chairman of the Indian Association of Uganda. "There are certain pockets where there's discontent, but that's a small percentage."

The current government has been pro-business, urging investment from people of any ancestry. Giving confiscated property back to the ousted Asians was the government's first step in soothing relations.

Many of the Asians forced out of Uganda have not taken up President Yoweri Museveni's call to return, disgusted by the country that uprooted them. But thousands have opted to give Uganda a second chance.

Of the 8,170 properties that were taken from Asians and doled out to black Ugandans by Mr. Amin, 3,493 properties were later returned to their owners. The government is accepting no more repossession claims, and officials said the panel that was set up to handle such claims, the Departed Asians Property Custodian Board, is scheduled to go out of existence next year.

But getting back the property took great effort even once the government issued a repossession certificate. Black Ugandans had been given the properties by Mr. Amin's regime and many of those to whom it had been given refused to leave.

Some disputes over property continue to this day, especially at the community schools that Asians had created by pooling their money. Those properties have been taken over by local governments, who are not inclined to hand them over to returning Asians.

Uganda's Asians say they do not spend much time dwelling on Mr. Amin, even after his name again began appearing in the news because of his failing health.

"The methods he used in throwing Asians out were not right, but you can't fault his intentions," said Mr. Dalal, the Indian association chairman, who moved to Uganda in 1993. "He wanted the indigenous Ugandans to get involved in business too, and that's happened. There's room enough for everyone here."