1. The Attenuation of the Caste System Among Hindus in the Caribbean

2. Amongst the Indians of St Lucia by Martin Latchana�

3. Racism in St Vincent Against� Indians�

4. Grenada: The Nyacks of Belmont Estate�

5 Sour memories of sweet Guyana�

6. Life of an indentured: Rani Singh�

7. The Enigma of Arrival: John Mohan in Port of Spain�

8. Baboolal Ramadhin of Barrackpore�

9. The Indian Community in Trinidad: an interview with Viranjini Munasinghe

10 The Wismar Massacre in Guyana�

11. Indian women of� Guyana

The Attenuation of the Caste System Among Hindus in the Caribbean

�by Anil J. Misir

�

Background

�

The arrival of Indians in the Caribbean under Indenture began in 1838.

Though Indenture ended in 1917, Indians remain a significant minority in

the Caribbean, constituting a majority of the population in Guyana, and

a plurality of the population in Trinidad. Indians, however, did not

remain unchanged in this new environment. Perhaps one of the most

notable social changes among Hindus (who constituted the majority of

Indian immigrants) was the attenuation of the caste system.

�

The caste system is a system of social organization in India which has

existed since ancient times. In the context of India, the hierarchical

caste system has a number of central features. Castes are endogamous

(caste members must marry within their caste group); non-commensal with

other castes (different castes often do not dine with each other,

especially at opposite ends of caste hierarchy), and adhere to certain

spatial restrictions regarding ?purity? (e.g., different castes in a

village setting often have different water wells). Hindu society in

India may be divided into a hierarchy of four varnas in the following

descending order: Brahmans (priests), Kshatriyas (warriors), Vaishyas

(traders), and Shudras (servants and labourers). The first three are

dvija, or twice born, as they can undergo a second ritual birth. A fifth

group consisting of Untouchables fall below the four varnas. Yet varnas

are not castes; rather, they are groupings of occupational castes called

jatis. It is these occupational groups to which the term ?caste? refers.

Among Shudras, for example, there may be different endogamous castes of

weavers, pottery artisans or launderers. It is important to note that

the caste system has been remarkably fluid throughout the history of

India and South Asia, with castes constantly rising and falling in

social standing, with new religious movements giving rise to new castes

and economic change creating new occupational groups which also led to

new castes.

�

Indentureship Forces Changes in Traditional Hinduism

�

In the Caribbean context, however, this system began to fundamentally

break down almost immediately to the extent that it is currently almost

non-existent, except for certain peripheral and residual functions. The

factors leading to its destruction have occurred as a result of two

separate but related groups of forces.

�

First, the very different social and political conditions that the

indentured Indian was subject to worked to radically undermine the basic

tenets and economies of the caste system. Secondly, and just as

importantly, religious accommodation in the form of a modified and

eventually homogenized Hinduism, ensured that the vast majority of

Hindus who did emigrate to the Caribbean retained their religion, even

as an allegedly fundamental part of it was rendered useless.

�

The social environment of the Caribbean differed substantially from that

that the emigrants left behind. Indeed, the very act of embarkation and

the sea voyage from India itself worked to undermine the system since

all emigrants were placed in the same conditions, regardless of caste ?

ritual laws concerning purity and pollution simply could not be

observed. The comparative lack of women emigrants also promoted caste

attenuation as intermarriage between upper and lower castes, an idea

previously unthinkable, was rendered necessary. Finally, the fact that

Indians arrived as individuals rather than as families, even as networks

of fictive kin were carefully constructed, worked against the retention

of caste.

�

Out of Necessity The Hindu Caste System Adapts

�

From the very outset, the system of indentureship slowly corroded the

system of caste. Every successive stage ? the stay at a depot in the

hinterland, the wait for embarkation at the metropole, the weeks-long

sea voyage, semi-communal life in the ex-slave barracks of the

plantation, the capitalist mindset of the cash-cropping plantation

management ? proved fatal to the maintenance and continuation of the

caste system. The idea of ritual pollution, the demarcation of

boundaries of commensality; the foundations of caste as the basis of

occupational specialization in the village economy its consequent

division of labour; caste endogamy ? none of these could survive in the

harsh alien conditions of the plantation. Indeed, a quote from an Indian

immigrant to the South Pacific colony of Fiji typifies the situation of

all indentured Indian emigrants:

�

One old woman told how she had set sail from Calcutta, and all on board

had started to cook dinner, each caste with its own hearth. Suddenly a

wave rocked the ship, all the cauldrons of food overturned onto the deck

together. It was a choice of eating food which had been mixed and

polluted, or of going hungry.

�

Even given these temporary conditions, it is conceivable that caste

could have re-formed at a later time had conditions been more

favourable. However, other indirect and more powerful forces were at

work that prevented this from happening. As early as 1865, a British

Guianese newspaper carried an article reporting that a high-caste Hindu

had been readmitted into his caste after dining with a pariah, simply by

paying $35 to hold a feast for the gods. The influences underlying this

profound social shift were related to the fact that the rights and

obligations of the immigrants in this new environment were quite alien

to the one from which they came.

�

The traditional village economy, for example, with its specific

economic, technological and social relations, was completely irrelevant.

The new economy was administered by European managers who simply did not

care about caste specifically, and the preservation of Indian ways in

general. The assignment of tasks to indentured Indians was given

irrespective of caste status and caste prohibitions. Moreover, the type

of economic specialization found in the villages from which the

indentured Indians were recruited simply did not exist. Men of different

castes worked at the same jobs, in the same gangs under the direction of

the overseer and were all paid at the same rate. Goods required by the

labourers were not produced by other castes, but were instead purchased

in the plantation store.

�

Just as importantly, the political system existing on the plantation

bore no relation to the caste system. Overall decisions were made by a

European manager and executed by a European overseer. Each overseer was

assisted by one or two drivers selected from the labourers, and

decisions made by the overseers and drivers had to be obeyed, regardless

of the caste of the driver and the field workers. Most plantations also

had courts presided over by management officials, who enforced policies

relating to social life, settling both private and public disputes.

These ranged from disputes between Hindus and Muslims, husbands and

wives and the composition of households. Furthermore, labourers were not

permitted to form associations to regulate important matters related to

their economic and social interests: though there were sporadic strikes

and other disputes, there were no panchayats, or caste councils. In

later years, however, managers permitted and helped in the formation of

religious associations, though the managers retained a close supervisory

role.

�

Thus the caste hierarchy received no support from the plantation social

and political environment. Rewards were dispensed based on ability and

obedience, rather than caste. Managers did not care for, and had enough

power to subvert, parallel hierarchies (such as caste) which would have

divided the labourers and made them less efficient. Managers could and

did intervene in areas which directly or indirectly affected discipline.

Any attempt for a high caste to assert superiority could easily have led

to the low caste victim complaining to management about provocation, at

which point authority would assert itself.

�

The Caste System and Endogamy

�

Equally, and perhaps even more importantly, caste endogamy was destroyed

by the relative scarcity of women. Given the nature of the work that

indentured Indians were recruited for, it was in the economic interest

of plantation managers to recruit young men. At the same time, this

obvious need was tempered by the fact that the presence of women and

potential wives for their workers would moderate the excesses of a group

of largely young, single men. Nevertheless, comparatively few women left

India under Indenture. Between 1844 and 1860, colonial regulations

required a ratio of 50 women to 100 men; in 1860, no ship could leave

harbour without a 50 to 50 ratio; however, from 1860 to 1863 the ratio

fell to 25/100, increasing slightly to 33 1/3 to 100 in 1863-65. This

was increased once again to 50/100 in 1866. After 1870, the ratio was

set to 40/100. It is clear, therefore, that men significantly

outnumbered women, a situation that had profound and far-reaching

effects on social evolution. Notions of caste superiority were rapidly

eroded. Hypogamy among men (?marrying down?) and hypergamy among women

(?marrying up?) became common: upper caste men married women of middle

or low caste origins. Even Brahmans, who in British Guiana comprised

about 2 percent of Indian immigrants, married lower caste women.

�

This situation was broadly applicable all over the Caribbean. One

observer in 1893 Trinidad noted that ?Members of the Chattri, Rajput,

and Thakur class frequently get married to or form connections with

women of a lower class.? Conspicuously, the position of girls was

inverted from the situation in India. Another observer in 1889 wrote

that among Trinidadian Indians ?a person with two or three female

children here has very valuable property, because men want wives?.

Indeed one aspect of this re-evaluation of daughters was the

replacement, at this time, of the institution of dowry with that of

bridewealth. Eventually, criteria other than caste, such as economic

status, became important considerations which were able to over-ride

caste considerations. By the beginning of the twentieth century in

Trinidad, for example, caste endogamy constituted a preferred, rather

than a prescribed form of marriage. The Caste System was certainly

breaking down, or at least adapting.

�

Given the months-long sea voyage from India to the Caribbean basin, it

is clear that Indians who arrived under Indenture were cut off from kin

and family ties. This alone might have served to attenuate caste

differences, but this factor was further enhanced by the fact that

emigrants from a given caste had few representatives in a given location

of Indenture. Quite simply, the emigrants were from a very large number

of different places, with different caste customs. Given that the nature

of caste identities and caste practises varied across India, the social

re-consolidation of any institutional framework, as it existed in

different parts of India, was simply impossible. For example, in

Trinidad in 1879-80, no less than 60 caste groups numbering some 2507

people emigrated, with some castes having as few as two representatives.

It is also important to note that a given individual could have many

levels of caste affiliation. Someone who was listed under the

comparatively popular caste of Ahir, for example, might easily have been

from a large number endogamous sub-castes. Indeed the statistics listed

above included emigrants from what some scholarly authorities have

described as eight separate ?caste-regions?, so that there was even

further scope for caste fragmentation.

�

Jahaji Bonds Strenghtened

�

Cut off from family and caste networks, an interesting social

institution developed that cut across caste and even religious lines ?

that of individuals who came on the same ship being a jahaji or jahajin

? a ship-brother or ship-sister. This institution essentially functioned

as a fictive kin network, working to overcome the social atomization

that many Indians felt upon arrival. This secular and egalitarian

concept proved remarkably strong. It symbolized a new start in a new

land, embodying the notion that new relationships and attitudes were

required in a foreign land. At the same time, it was pragmatic: it

ensured the survival of the idea of extended kinship and encouraged a

spirit of mutual obligation among those who had travelled on the same

ship. Vertovec writes about Trinidad, but the same ideas can be said to

hold true for British Guiana, or any other location of indenture:

�

A deep friendship was forged between diverse individuals (even between

Hindus and Muslims) on the voyage to the new country?. Such friends

would seek to serve their indenture on the same estates, and to settle

near each other after their contracts had expired. Thereafter, they came

to treat each other?s families as nata, or fictive kin, with whom

marriage was frowned upon (many of these fictive relationships continue

to exist between families in Trinidad today). Strong emotional bonds of

this sort acted as important foundations for ? the creation of shared

social and cultural institutions.

�

Fictive kin thus not only included members of other castes, but members

of other religions as well. Even ?family? was not of the same caste!

�

Role of High Caste Brahmins in Facing Challenges to the New Hinduism

�

These social pressures also served to reinforce another means of change

? religious accommodation. The Hinduism practiced in the Caribbean

consequently underwent significant changes, which further accelerated

the decline of caste. For example, Brahmans, who occupy a privileged

position at the apex of the purity/pollution hierarchy of caste, reacted

to the actions of aggressive Christian missionaries by inducting lower

caste Hindus into the ?Great Tradition? of Sanatan Dharma. Hinduism

itself became less doctrinaire, and more flexible, adapting itself to

the environment. Notably, the egalitarian bhakti current of Hinduism

gained ground, stressing a personal, ecstatic relationship with God.

Hinduism in the Caribbean context thus became more homogenous and

egalitarian which slowly worked against the retention of notions of caste.

�

Perhaps the most striking aspect of religious change was the reaction of

the high-caste Brahmans. Despite the harsh environment, they

nevertheless made sure to attend to the spiritual needs of their people.

This is perhaps understandable when one considers the monopoly that

Brahman pandits had on many aspects of religious scripture in India.

They alone could determine auspicious days, determine astrological

information, as well as conduct important life cycle rites such as

marriages, funerals and the naming of children. Religious continuity was

entirely dependent upon their knowledge and effort. Indeed, one of the

reasons why Hinduism decayed in Jamaica and other minor areas of

indentureship was the comparative lack of Brahman pandits. In major

areas of indentureship, Brahmans retained a position of relative

privilege, not due to declining notions of caste and ritual purity, but

due to their monopoly of priestcraft.

�

Almost startling is their reaction to the aggressive efforts of the

proselytising Christian missionaries. In the face of this threat, the

pandits adapted: they visited sugar estates and Indian villages,

performing wedding ceremonies, religious readings and other Hindu

ceremonies. In a sense, they became parish priests, serving as gurus to

individual families and offering counselling on a range of social and

secular matters. A measure of their success may be gleaned from the

despair of a missionary in British Guiana in 1893 who said that ?[the

pandits exerted a] pernicious and powerful presence over the people,?

and that they tried ?their utmost to oppose and set aside the teaching

and preaching of the Christian missionaries?.

�

Indeed a rigid adherence to ancient proscriptive law in the Caribbean in

the nineteenth and twentieth centuries would have been

counterproductive. For certainly, a more active and flexible approach to

Hinduism was necessary. But perhaps the greatest manifestation of this

flexibility was the embracing of the lowest castes to form a corporate

pan-Hindu identity. The Chamars, the Dusadhs, the Doms and the Bhangis ?

all were admitted and encouraged to join the Sanatan Dharma tradition.

This ?conversion? was by no means one-way, as the lower castes responded

with eagerness. As Jayawardena observes:

�

Since is was a ?higher class cult? it was an attraction to the low

castes who had traditionally belonged to cults and sects with

distinctive gods and rites because they had been excluded?. The

redefinition of Hinduism as one religion common to all Indians led to

acceptance of Sanatan Dharma by the small groups.

�

This was perhaps the most momentous and consequential ideological shift

of the Brahman pandits. The lowest castes could now have unprecedented

access to pandits in their homes. Brahmans would even eat the cooked

food of the former untouchable. This was the ultimate symbol of change.

�

This is all the more striking when one considers the relative numbers of

adherents to the various versions of Hinduism that came with the

indentured Indians to the Caribbean. Mandelbaum (1966) gives a model of

Hinduism in India in which a transcendent complex of universal gods,

Sanskrit texts and rituals, dominated by priests of Brahman castes, is

differentiated from a pragmatic complex of local gods, Sanskrit texts

and rituals, dominated by local gods and low-caste priests. Given that

the vast majority of Indian indentured labourers were not Brahman

priests, it is reasonable to expect that a syncretic pragmatic complex

would have emerged while the transcendent complex atrophied and

disappeared. Yet precisely the opposite happened. In Surinam, for

example, Hinduism was made Brahmanical by purifying it from

?unacceptable? aspects, as for example the offering of cattle to

?illness deities?. To counter the popularity of spirit possession, the

magical aspects of Brahmanical Hinduism were emphasized. (Interestingly

as well, other ethnic groups offered competition for this pragmatic

complex, as is shown by the example of the Creole Winti specialist

Bonuman.) Thus the higher status Sanatan Dharma version of Hinduism

became dominant. This effort, indeed has precedents in India proper, in

which context it is known as sanskritization. In the Caribbean context,

however, the element of caste underwent a metamprhphosis as well,

resulting in the wholesale adoption of very similar versions of Hinduism

by all Hindus.

�

Doctrinal Flexibility Allowed Sanatan Dharma to Flourish

�

The doctrinal flexibility of Hinduism was also important. In Hinduism

there were and are no weighty, immutable dogmas of universal

application. Nothing intrinsic to Hinduism prevented a direct, intimate

contact from developing between the dvija Brahman priest and the most

humble labourer in his thatched hut, or his barrack-room on the

plantation. In fact, it was this informal contact that provide the

initial principal location for the practise of Hinduism. No mandirs

(temples) were needed: neighbours, friends and jahajis attended the

ceremonial kathas or Hanuman poojas (often called jhandis), officiated

by the Brahman priest in the home of people of all castes. This

facilitated religious continuity among the indentured labourers in

British Guiana, long before community Hindu temples were constructed. As

late as 1955, the anthropologist Elliot Skinner, noted the marginal role

of the temple in the practise of Hinduism in a British Guianese village.

�

? The Hindus do not go at all to the nearest temple, though it is only

two miles away. Despite the absence of temples, the presence of the

Hindus is revealed by red and white flags flying from tall bamboo poles.

These flags are erected during a ceremony called ?jhandi?, at which a

family gives thanks for some special favour they have received through

prayers.

�

�

The variant of Hinduism practised in the Caribbean setting was flexibly

adapted to the environment. It was neither austere, nor excessively

metaphysical or philosophical. The pageantry of ritual and the rhythmic

music offered respite from the difficulties of life on the plantation.

Murtis, the alleged idols so hated by the Christian missionaries,

brought the gods into one?s own simple home.

�

Another religious adaptation involved the emphasis of the bhakti

tradition of Hinduism, particularly the Vaishnavite variant (in which

the Hindu god Vishnu in his various incarnations is ecstatically

worshipped). Brought along by the Northeast Indian emigrants who

constituted the bulk of the indentured Indians in the Caribbean, it

stressed three principle ideas: egalitarianism over particularistic

caste ethics, individualism, and the direct relaxation of the caste

system and its associated notions of purity/impurity. These allowed

individual Hindus to exist in more personal relationship with their

deities: they did not need a ?pure? human being to act as their mediator

with the divine. Communal worship was stressed, which was particularly

important given the low number of representatives from any given caste

group. In addition, it encouraged the reading of the Ramayana by laymen,

and the collective singing of bhajan (hymns of praise) by the

congregation. It further allowed for the expositions of the Bhagavata

Purana by pandits.

�

Sanatan Dharma adapted itself to the spiritual and secular needs of the

people. It decreased the pain of separation with the homeland, and

facilitated adaptation. Fused with the bhakti tradition, the egalitarian

and individualistic cornerstones of the new Hinduism encouraged effort

and accomplishment, which was particularly important given the radically

different set of economic relations on the capitalistic plantation. Just

as importantly, the changed relation between the Brahman pandits (as

gurus) and their ?parishioners? (an idea directly lifted, to good

effect, from the Christian missionaries) strengthened the indentured

Indians in their daily struggles. As a result of these various factors,

therefore, a more homogenous Hinduism became the faith of all castes. As

religion became more egalitarian, often by conscious effort, caste was

eroded.

�

Thus the conditions and responses to Indenture served to rapidly

undermine notions of caste. Profound social and political differences

resulted in an entirely new set of individual and group relations.

Religious accommodation also served to destroy what is often thought of

as an integral part of Hinduism, showing it instead to be an unnecessary

encumbrance.

�

Attenuation of Caste

�

In the modern Caribbean setting, caste has become even more attenuated.

Caste no longer functions as a feature which determines social structure

nor one that affects social interaction in any significant way. Some

authors have termed the lingering effect of caste as one of ?a residual

aspect of prestige? in which caste is used to create evaluations of

self-esteem, or simply as a ?social attribute in its own right?

sometimes offsetting other social characteristics. For example, a

wealthy community leader may be from a Chamar background: he will be

respected and admired, but if he should do something to the dislike of

the others, the offended parties will resort to verbal abuse concerning

his caste. Even so, it is fairly clear that caste is not the potent

force it once was.

�

It is interesting also that legitimization for Brahmans currently takes

the form of knowledge of rituals and Sanskritic texts, rather than caste

birth. Though currently there is some residual desire among some who

consider themselves Brahmans to main caste identity and hierarchy, based

on the normative ideals of religious texts, even this truncated notion

is disappearing. The question of whether a non-Brahman can become a

priest is indeed a hotly debated topic in Trinidad. For the younger

generation, as Vertovec pointed out in 1992, even this debate is largely

irrelevant:

�

Most members of younger generations of Indo-Trinidadians, however, have

lost practically all concern for caste: although many are still able to

identify their caste group or varna, most young people simply shrug and

say that caste is in ?an ol? time Indian t?ing?, best forgotten.

�

�

The Caribbean has changed Indians who live there in profound ways. In at

least this respect, this change may have been for the better.

�

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

�

References

�

Books

�

Clarke, C., et al., eds. South Asians Overseas. Migration and Ethnicity.

Cambridge University Press. New York: 1990.

�

Mishra, V. Rama?s Banishment. A Centenary Tribute to the Fiji Indians,

1879-1979. Heinemann Educational Books, New Hampshire, 1979.

�

Moore, B. Cultural Resistance and Pluralism. Colonial Guyana 1838-1900.

McGill-Queen?s University Press. Montreal & Kingston: 1995

�

Schwartz, B, ed. Caste in Overseas Indian Communities. Chandler

Publishing Company, San Francisco: 1967.

�

Seecharan, C. Tiger in the Stars: The Anatomy of Indian Achievement in

British Guiana 1919-29. Macmillan Education, Ltd. London: 1997.

�

Stein, B. A History of India. Blackwell Publishers Limited. Oxford: 1998.

�

Vertovec, S. Hindu Trinidad. Religion, Ethnicity, and Socio-Economic

Change. Macmillan Education, Ltd. London: 1992.

�

�

Articles

�

Hazareesingh, K. ?The Religion and Culture of Indian Immigrants in

Mauritius and the Effect of Social Change.? Comparative Studies in

Society and History. Vol. 8, pp. 241-257, 1965-1966.

�

Jayawardena, C. ?Religious Belief and Social Change: Aspects of the

Development of Hinduism in British Guiana.? Comparative Studies in

Society and History. Vol. 8, pp. 211-240, 1965-1966.

�

Jayawardena, C. ?The Disintegration of Caste in Fiji Indian Rural

Society.? Anthropology in Oceania. Essays Presented to Ian Hogbin.

Hiatt, L., and Jayawardena, C., eds. Angus and Robertson. London: 1971.

�

Mangru, B. ?Tadjah in British Guiana?. Indo-Caribbean Resistance. Frank

Birbalsingh, ed. TSAR. Toronto: 1993

�

Neihoff, A. ?The Survival of Hindu Institutions in an Alien

Environment?. The Eastern Anthropologist, Vol 12, No 3, pp 171-185,

March-May 1959.

�

Nevadomsky, J. ?Changes in Hindu Institutions in an Alien Environment?.

The Eastern Anthropologist, Vol 33:1, pp 39-53, January-March 1980.

�

van der Burg, C., and van der Veer, P. ?Pandits, power and profit:

religious organization and the construction of identity among Surinamese

Hindus.? Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol. 9, Number 4, pp514-528, October

1986.

�

Stein, p.57.

Stein, p.57.

Schwartz, pp. 204-205.

Mangru, p. 20.

Schwartz, p. 51.

02/02/2005�

BLPR1O1-151

PROF. MOSES SEENARINE

SPRING 2000. TERM PAPER

I will prove that the East Indian population of St. Vincent receives the majority of racism against their minority group.

I will do this by proving East Indians are the minority of the island, that the Black population In St. Vincent are extremely prejudiced against the East Indians, pointing out the stereotypes and myths told about the East Indians.

I will prove that this racism against them stems from times of enslavement, and I will further prove that due to the racism and prejudiced, East Indians in St. Vincent have been deculturated. I will use written sources as well as interviews to prove my argument.

�

GRENADA: THE NYACKS OF BELMONT ESTATE

�

�

In 1944 Norbert and Lyris Nyack of Hermitage, St. Patrick purchased Belmont Estate, in St Patrick, Grenada from the trustees of the Houston Family.

�

The Nyacks were the first Grenadians of Indian decent to own an estate on the island. Though simple people with only a basic education from the River Sallee Government School, they were both entrepreneuring, diligent and savvy. They made Belmont Estate their home and the base of their new business - operating the plantation. At one time they owned six of the most productive estates on the island – Waltham & Diamond in St. Mark; Plains, Le Tage & Belmont in St. Patrick; and Mt Horne in St. Andrew – and employed more than a thousand persons.

�

The Nyacks also purchased the Hankeys business at Grenville and commenced the business of a supermarket, hardware store and lumberyard. Mr. and Mrs. Nyack were also horse lovers. They owned several horses over the years and raced and won at horse races in Grenada, and Barbados, Trinidad and Guyana. They established the Telescope Race track, just outside of Grenville, a popular sporting and social destination in Grenada in the fifties and sixties. They were a socially vibrant couple – entertaining and being entertained.

�

They both had strong social and civil consciences. They gave of their time, talent, love and money. Without fanfare, they shared benevolently with Grenada’s Homes for children, the elderly, hospitals, churches and schools, and to individuals or causes in need. Mr. Nyack was actively involved in politics, and he was appointed Senator, by Premier Eric M. Gairy, a post he held until his death in 1969. His wife Lyris continued to reside at and manage the affairs of Belmont Estate up until her death on December 19, 2001, at the age of 94. She was laid to rest close to her residence at the estate. Belmont continues to be owned by the Nyack Family.

�

Belmont Estate is a rich historical site. Dating back to the late 1600s and early 1700s, the estate was owned by the Bernego family of France. Following the cession of the island by the French to the British in 1763, the estate became the property of Mr. John Aitcheson Jr. of Rochsolloch, Airdie, Scotland.

�

Upon his death Belmont Estate went to his father, Mr. John Aitcheson Sr. who in 1770 leased the estate to Mr. Alexander Campbell Esq., owner of the then adjoining estate, Tivoli. The lease was for a period 13 years at a price of �2,520 a year.

�

In 1780, Mr. Aitcheson Sr. left Scotland for his estate, Belmont where he died on May 31st, 1780 at age 75. He was buried at the estate’s cemetery. In his will, Aitcheson bequeathed to his eldest daughter Bethia all his property in Grenada which she was to sell in the event of his death and after paying all his debts, the proceeds were to be shared between her two sisters, Margaret and Isabella, and his nephew Gilbert Hamilton, a merchant in Glasgow. At the time of Aitcheson’s death, the total value of the estate’s assets - including the slaves, animals, sugar mill, coppers, stews, ladles, skimmers, sugar pots, stills, furnaces, still heads, tools, implements, chattels, lands and buildings - was �21,183.00 about �1.5 million or US$2.5 million by today’s standards.

�

Following Aitcheson’s death Belmont was sold to Robert Alexander Houston of Clerkington, East Lothian in Scotland. Following his death Belmont was bequeathed to Major James Flower Houston and his son Lieutenant Alexander Houston of Her Majesty’s Royal Artillery, both of whom were from Montepelier Square, London. The estate remained in the hands of the Houston Family for more than 170 years.

Throughout its history, Belmont has made played a major role in Grenada’s agricultural economy. In the late 1600s and early 1700s, it was one of the 81 plantations established on the island with coffee being its major produce. Sugarcane was introduced as the main crop later in the 1700s; the ruins of the water mill remain as testament to that part of its history. Cotton was also a major crop of the estate, being later replaced with cocoa, nutmegs in the 1800s and later bananas. The estate is still a major producer of cocoa and nutmegs for export.

The estate is one of those that received Indian indentured workers

Today, Belmont Estate welcomes visitors both local and tourists, to tour and witness a traditional historic plantation at work. There is also a restaurant and cultural presentations. As far as we can tell, nothing Indian is offered.

The family has also opened a museum of their own possessions so you can learn what life was like on a working plantation 50 years ago.

�

�

Sour Memories of Sweet Guyana

�

��� At this same time Guyana was through a very tough time because of its bias and racial politics. Dr. Jagan and the PPP had lost to Mr. L.F.S. Burnham and his PNC Party, which formed a coalition with Mr. Peter D'Aguiar who was the leader of the United Force. The East Indians supported Jagan, the Negroes voted for Burnham and the Portuguese, the middle-class and businessmen supported D'Aguiar.

��������� At one time Burnham belonged to the PPP and he and Jagan were buddies. At that time the country was called British Guiana, after Independence, the country was renamed "Guyana."� Jagan and Burnham even went to India to visit the Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, then Prime Minister of India. Nehru was a pupil of the Great Mahatma Mohandas Gandhi, the father of non-violence. Nehru sympathized with Guyana's situation with the British. Nehru withstood 9 prison sentences for non-cooperation with the British. Jagan went to prison for the same thing. Burnham was his right hand and the Indians and Negroes lived in harmony.

��������� The violence started to roll all over Georgetown. There were chain gangs, which roamed the streets with bicycle chains, which they used to smoke the helpless East Indian folks, by lashing them as they walk, ride bicycles or evn in passenger cars. The women were robbed in public places as the police looked the other way. After any PNC political meeting they were urged to get even. They climaxed their anger by rioting and looting only the Indian stores in Georgetown.

��������� The gov't. banned all firearms yet the blacks had guns. Those who opposed the government, would be removed from their homes in the dead of night, disappeared or were sent to Sibley Hall, a detention prison up the Demerara River. There were numerous reports of corpses found in rivers, trenches, by the roadside, in culverts and by railway lines or at farms and abandoned areas.

��������� Vigilantes were in every village in the countryside. In Kitty we also got together and formed a vigilante group, I went out for my Uncle who was not well, actually I think he was scared. My shift was from 7 to 12 in the night. It was very scary and nerve racking. We were armed with only sticks and whistles and whenever a truck approached us, our hearts were in our hands, for there was no way to recognise the enemy from the real soldiers. Many blacks somehow got access to army uniform and ammunition. Bombs thrown from passing trucks killed many vigilantes.

��������� When we saw an approaching vehicle, we dispersed and laid flat on the ground by the parapet until the vehicle passed. Many times I said my prayers and thought of Deeca and remembered her smile and pretty face, for that is the last memory with which I want to leave this life.

��������� Going to the city, Georgetown, was like running the gauntlet �and you said a silent prayer when and if you arrived home safely. There was fighting, killing and even massacres as what happened at Wismar, a very prosperous little town near MacKenzie (Now called Linden after Burnham) up the Demerara River where the two races lived in harmony.

���������� The Burnham’s gov't. put a ban on the document called the X-13 Plan. A plan of the Guyana Coastland divided into 13 sections where East Indians were predominant. The PNC intended to annihilate all East Indians at a certain time on a certain day. The Wismar affair backfired and the plan eventually fell in the hands of the Opposition.

��������� The Gov't., speechless and embarrassed, and of course denied any knowledge of its existence. Anyone who was caught with a copy of this hot document, were sent straight to Sibley Hall without a trial. Many copies were floating in the PPP strongholds. Goon squads were sent out to houses of PPP activists and printing shops to search for the X-13 Plan.

��������� Today the Indo and Afro Guyanese born in N/A don’t have an iota of knowledge of what happened on that fateful day of May 24^th 1964. They should know for just like the 28 terrible years of Burnham, its part of our history and we don’t want to repeat History

��������� Sometimes it’s very hard to pretend that all is well in your country, when politicians put their ideology before people, when they bury their heads in the sands, preach denial or just plain scared to handle the truth. It makes me mad and very sad. Mad because I can’t take a gun and go on a rampage, can’t talk about it for its not politically correct and sad because they politicians who are in power, whom you voted for, who promised to do something have done nothing and turned out to be a big disappointment, and many folks are left by the wayside holding their heads and crying for justice. Sad also because the world, the West Indies and not even the UN never did anything to bring closure to the victims and survivors of this tragedy.

�

��������� The violence was so much out of control that the British had to send troops to Guyana to keep the peace, but by time they reached Georgetown, the damage was done.

�

��������� The atrocities should be brought to justice as they did in South Africa headed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. As I’m writing this several Harvard faculty members will be flying to South Africa at the end of this month to meet with Archbishop Desmond Tutu and South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The Harvard group, along with colleagues from India, Israel, and American universities and law schools, is studying the role of truth commissions in preventing conflict in divided societies as part of a multiyear project sponsored by the World Peace Foundation. Maybe Guyana can get involved in this too.

��������� Since this massacre happened I ran into many folks who once lived in Wismar, and they all had one thing in common about the violence. They all claimed that if the police were not all Blacks this would not have been so catastrophic. Not only they looked the other way with violence taking place before their eyes, they helped and did some damage too. Many members of the Police and Volunteer Forces took part in the looting, beating and killing of Indo-Guyanese as they had specialized military training as a profession.
In one incident two armed Black Volunteers refused to intervene when two Indo-Guyanese women were being raped. Instead, the women had to be rescued by employees from DEMBA. In another case, the Volunteer Force shot a young Indo-Guyanese man to death because he refused to stop at their command.

��������� I was born at Nabaclis, sandwiched by Cove & John and Golden Grove, predominantly Negro populated villages, I grew up with Negroes and we got along fine. I still remember my best friends were blacks, Vibert and Marvin, who all lived at Nabaclis, my neighbours were blacks, the Scotlands, I’m still looking for Vincy and Sancho. But when blacks did something like this because they were politically motivated, it’s too much to swallow. For the black folks I knew were humane folks just like us.

��������� �Imagine a black woman shouting, showing no remorse “De gat wa dem deserve" (They coolies get what they deserved). Did the family whose home was burnt and was confronted by a large mob who beat the wife unconscious, repeatedly stabbing the husband and then continuing to kick and molest two smaller children deserved this kind of dying? Were the women who were raped then got their private parts damaged by pop bottles deserved such excruciating pains?

��������� However, some families who managed to escape from the villages into the nearby forest were also hunted down like animals. They wanted to leave no living evidence. In addition to the mass burning and looting which resulted in over 1500 Indo-Guyanese becoming homeless, and the indiscriminate beating of Indo-Guyanese men, women, and children, 8 women were raped including two girls. Some of the women were repeatedly raped as the marauding band took turns on Indo-Guyanese women victims.

��������� This figure may even be higher since Guyanese women who were victims of rape seldom come forward and admit to such a heinous crime due to the shame associated with it. One man was also burnt alive. Another, Mr. Ramjattan, a supporter of the PPP was found decapitated.

��������� This was not Darfur, it happened in Guyana and for 38 hours it happened to 2,000 Indo-Guyanese living in Wismar when over 18,000 Afro Guyanese� armed with cutlasses, wooden poles, gasoline bombs and guns burnt and destroyed over 230 Indo-Guyanese homes and businesses.

��������� I say to all Guyanese how can this atrocious catastrophe go unpaid and swept under the carpet? Indo-Guyanese who thought they could find shelter in their own homes were confronted and beaten by large mobs of Afro-Guyanese screaming kill de coolies as their homes were burnt to the ground. Injuries were in the hundreds, ranging from gunshot wounds, knife wounds, burns, broken bones, and mutilated bodies. One Indo-Guyanese man had both his legs and feet broken. An employee from the Demerara Bauxite Company said: "The Indians never had a chance".

��������� One man from Wismar who barely escaped by hiding in the river told me, “The blacks were telling the police they gone that way and the fire is over there, and when the police gone that way and over there, they continued their looting, burning and killing nearby.” The scariest part of this affair was the PNC were the master mind behind this massacre and they had it all planned in black and white called the X-13 Plan. Guyana’s mostly predominantly East Indian areas were divided and they were going to attack all 13 areas at once. This called for a lot of strategy and logistics which can only be done by specialists many who were in the Police Force.� Wismar was the guinea pig and the pig got slaughtered.

��������� Two river steamers were commissioned to take the first batch of 1300 Indo-Guyanese refugees to Georgetown where they were booed, jeered, and pelted with bricks by Blacks as they arrived. A Red Cross worker said of the survivors: "Few wept, but the hundreds of children appeared terrified and frightened." In those 38 hours of the massacre no Afro-Guyanese was arrested and only two wounded by bullets.

��������� Mrs. Janet Jagan, then Minister of Home Affairs on June 1st in a speech to the Guyana Parliament equated the suffering at Wismar to genocide since the police had done nothing to prevent the massacre. She said,

�"It is possible for anyone to believe that, with the widespread violence, arson, rape, and murder, there could have been no show of force by the armed police and armed volunteers. Since this is impossible to accept, one can only come to the conclusion that planned genocide of a village was carried out with the connivance of all concerned."
She then resigned to protest the British Police Commissioner not responding to her orders.

��Shortly thereafter, Guyanese were to learn that their country would be granted political independence two years thence.� And what would be that date? You may guess it by now. May 26 1966.

�Who set that date? Why was that date chosen? Your guess may be as good as mine!

�

This year May 26^th� 2007 is a Saturday when Guyanese would celebrate Independence Day, all Guyanese should clamour for a change of date, for how can I stand and sing Greenland of Guyana and think of what happened to those poor folks at Wismar 43 years ago. All I can think of is this poet who expounded on this subject about Wismar:

�

REMEMBER WISMAR

�

��������� It was a dark and red-lettered night

��������� When they swept down on peaceful Wismar

��������� Leaving a people in a miserable plight

��������� Leaving each with an indelible scar

�

��������� The mastermind was the infamous Chippy

��������� Whose ambition was to kill every man

��������� Woman and child in that peaceful� ommunity

��������� By carrying out the evil X-13 Plan

�

��������� They swept down viciously on doves like hawks

��������� With blazing guns and set bayonets

��������� Annihilating all that walks and all that talks

��������� Sparing none with their racist bullets

���������

��������� Not even the sleeping babies escaped

��������� Not even the pregnant women and mothers

��������� Even the young and aged were raped

��������� Even the children and little sisters

�

��������� And as if that was not enough for these animals

��������� All the innocent females were defiled

��������� And many were crippled as in historical annals

��������� Of wars of the barbarous and the wild

�

��������� After they butchered the inhabitants

��������� They did their looting and burning

��������� Pillaging the shops and restaurants

��������� And swiftly left Wismar a-smoking

�

��������� Yes they left the city ablaze

��������� And the waters red with blood

��������� This was only the first phase

��������� Leaving body parts in the mud

�

��������� Death was welcomed by those in excruciating pain

��������� As the waters of the Essequibo carry the chill

��������� Many committed suicides and many became insane

��������� And their plight is always remembered still

�

��������� And on a very still or clear day one can hear

��������� The cries of babies and their groans from afar

��������� The wailing wenches and women in agony and fear

�

�

Life of an indentured: Rani Singh

�

Mayda Ghany (mother of Fran Seebaran) and Rani Singh, Mayda's mother in this 1944 photograph. Photo courtesy Fran Seebaran

By Adrian Boodan

IN 2006, Francisca Seebaran journeyed from her home in Dallas, Texas, in the United States, to India, hoping to get some insight into the life of Rani Singh, her maternal grandmother who came to T&T as an indentured labourer.

Seebaran hopes to produce a motion picture on Rani’s life one day and the role she played in turning her life around at a time when women in India were faced with little choices after becoming widows.

After a year of constant coaxing, Seebaran decided to tell Rani’s story to the Guardian.

Rani was born in India in 1889 to a financially comfortable Thakoor/Thakur caste family of landowners.

At 22 years old, Rani married Debi Singh, a high-ranking Indian army officer, and in April, 1912, gave birth to a daughter Parbatia. Soon afterwards Singh died and Rani’s in-laws started ill-treating her.

Rani and Parbatia soon left the home because she would not take any of the three traditional choices offered to Hindu widows; which were to commit Suttee, by burning herself on her husband’s funeral pyre; spend the rest of her life in an ashram (temple); or marry her husband’s youngest brother. Rani decided instead to leave India.

In July, 1912, Rani was approached by a Kangani (a recruiter for the indentured workers). Seebaran said: The recruiter told her Trinidad was by far a much better place and the streets were paved in gold; she was further enticed by the 15 shillings a week offered to Coolies going to Trinidad. All she had to do was chiney chalay (sift sugar) and food and all living accommodations would be provided.

Rani agreed.

At the sub-depot of Kanpur on July 6, 1912, Rani told the magistrate she would consent to migrate to Trinidad.

She travelled by train to the main Immigration Depot in Calcutta, where she and Parbatia stayed for 15 days; mother and daughter were checked by a doctor and issued a health clearance certificate on July 9, 1912.

On July 22, 1912, Rani, Parbatia and 404 other immigrants were taken out to sea to board the SS Indus. They shared a cabin with several other single female passengers and their young children, and slept on bags on the floor. Bhaat (rice) and dhal (split peas) soon became Rani’s staple meal for the voyage.

On September 12, 1912, after 62 days at sea, the ship docked at the Immigration Depot at Nelson Island.

following a three-day quarantine, Rani and little Parbatia travelled by small boat to the Port-of-Spain jetty, and were later transported by mule carts to the Non-Pariel cocoa estate in Sangre Grande. They moved into a tiny room in a barrack house occupied by ten families. Mother and daughter were allotted a clay stove for cooking and bags for sleeping on the floor.

At first Rani tended the flower and vegetable gardens around the main estate house; she later became a domestic servant in the main house.

Seebaran said: Mrs Fabian, the childless estate manager’s wife, grew fond of Rani and Parbatia and treated Parbatia as her own.

Mrs Fabian christened Parbatia a Roman Catholic, but to Rani and Parbatia, this was only for outward conformity, as they maintained their Hindu faith for the rest of their lives.”

Seebaran said it was during the lonely years that Parbatia remembers seeing her mother, sitting on the floor in a corner of the barrack room, with her ohrni (head scarf) covering her head, and thick silver bracelets on her hands and feet, smoking a chulum pipe and crying uncontrollably.

Parbatia later understood that her mother was grieving for Baba, her younger brother she left behind in India.

Parbatia’s early memories included the second marriage of her mother Rani to Abdul Ghany, a muslim, who gave Parbatia the Muslim name Hapijan.

On December 19, 1914, Rani gave birth to Karim, Ghany’s son. Rani dubbed the child Baba, in memory of her brother.

In 1917, Ghany and Rani Ghany concluded their indentureship contract at Non Pariel cocoa estate and headed for the Golden Grove coconut estate at Arouca. The couple had six other children.

Ghany loved his new country and never considered returning to India.

He bought several pieces of real estate at bargain prices, and soon became a successful landowner, businessman and landlord of rented houses despite his lack of education.

In 1947, after a long, painful battle with cancer, Rani died at age 58 in Garden Village, Arouca. During her illness, her 18-year-old daughter, Maida (Seebaran’s mother), kept a close bedside vigil and cared for Rani with much love and attention.

Abdul eventually remarried an East Indian woman named Bhagwanti, and ran his provision shop on the Eastern Main Road in Laventille, as well as his rental properties until his death to cancer in 1960, at the Port-of-Spain General Hospital.

Usha Manhas-Singh of Dallas, left, and Fran Seebaran, a Trinidadian now resident in Dallas, USA, check out a rice field in the Punjab when the duo, along with Guardian photographer Adrian Boodan, visited the area near the Pakistani border in 2006. Photo: Adrian Boodan

�

The Enigma of Arrival: John Mohan in Port of Spain

From left, Jang Bahadoor, Brownie Qawaal, John Mohan, Siu Persad and Jhagroo Qawal.

By Kim Johnson

"My real name is Dharam Dev Mohan, but I was known as John," says John Mohan, after whom, he claims, John John was named.

Mohan, 85, is reminiscing with boyhood friends Narsaloo Ramaya and Abdul Samad at Samad's Morne Coco home in Petit valley.

I'm here because these were the true arrivants in a different sense.

Indian Arrival Day marks the landing of the Fatel Rozack on May 30, but the actual "arrival" of Indians was a more complex, drawn out event. It involved less the physical arrival of indentured labourers than their children and grandchildren' s assumption that Trinidad was home.

Mohan's grandmother never spoke English. She referred to him in Bhojpuri as "Jaan," meaning "dear one." It was anglicised into John.

He was born in Laventille. After indentureship at Petit Morne estate his grandparents, who carted coal to sell in Port-of-Spain, moved to Old St Joseph Road opposite Toll Gate, where carts paid a penny to enter the city.

That was around 1900. Later his grandfather bought five acres, two perches of Picton Hill.

"It was very hilly, with mainly blue stone and gru gru," recalls Mohan.

Other Indian families settled there, mostly from Petit Morne. They built shacks, 25 in all, renting from Mohan's grandfather, who raised a track of rock that's still known as "Stone Hill."

There were also one Portuguese family, De Freitas; Henrietta Stafford from Barbados, whose husband was a ship's cook; and Josiah Moore, better known as "Toujour Breaks."

"He was very muscular and had large, red eyes and thick lips," recalls Mohan. "He played stick but never charged, he always breaks.

"Toujour Breaks had a beautiful handwriting and wrote all the receipts for my grandfather, who allowed him to live on his plot free."

It was Toujour Breaks who told Mohan that John John might have been named after him.

Ramaya was closer to India. His parents crossed the black sea in 1912. Although his mother, having fled a brutal marriage in India, knew she could never return, Ramaya's father never ceased to pine for India.

Ramaya, however, born in Forres Park in 1920, is nostalgic only for the sugar estate of his formative years.

"I played, romped, bathed and fished in the pond, played bat and ball in the factory yard, flew kites, spinned tops, skated down the hills, pitched marbles," he told me on a previous occasion.

"That the task work was getting harder, and the estate was employing fewer and fewer people, was not part of my world.

"My life consisted of school and play, whereas my parents' days were filled with only work and more work, and hardly any time for relaxation. Consequently, when my parents packed up in 1931 and moved to Port-of-Spain, as beautiful and wonderful as the city appeared in my eyes, still I wept and begged my father to take us back."

Moving to Duncan Street in 1931 Ramaya enrolled in the Bethlehem RCI School (the Roman Catholic Indian or "Coolie School"), where he befriended Mohan and Samad.

Samad's Muslim parents were immigrants. His mother came on the same boat as Mohan's grandmother. His father, a tailor, was close to other immigrants, such as knife-sharpener Sela Meah, who had a small mosque up Rose Hill.

"Meah" is a Muslim honorific, and Sela indicated his vocation before arrival — sailor.

Growing up in Port-of-Spain, the three friends, especially Mohan and Ramaya, discovered their Indianness in 1935, when the first Indian movie came down, Bala Jobhan.

"It was a revelation for us, for me in particular," recalls Mohan.

"Literally, bala means youth and jobhan is breasts, but it really refers to a teenager," he says, "but I didn't know that. I ask a fella and he say `Learn Hindi.' He say it crudely and it hit me, so I decide to learn the language."

Ramaya's eyes were opened too.

"Samad had told me about a movie advertised with photographs of Indian stars in the showcase of a Frederick Street store," he had told me before. "It was opening at Globe theatre, which had only been built two years earlier.

"Already familiar with Hollywood movies and their glittering array of beautiful screen stars, Samad was excited by the idea of an Indian movie."

The movie gave Indo-Trinis a sense of self-respect from which they could engage the Creole world.

"It was," explained Ramaya, "a revolution in consciousness. "

Ramaya bought a violin and joined a small Indian orchestra led by Samad's brother-in-law Chook Cham, a tailor in whose shop they all limed. Mohan and Samad got mandolins, but never took it seriously. Ramaya did, and became an accomplished Indian musician.

"We'd go Indian singing competition, riding all Chaguanas from Port-of-Spain at night," says Mohan.

"Once rain start to fall—flood, we cyar see the road. All of a sudden one fella in front disappear: he gone down the drain. We pull him and the bike out and reach the hall soaking wet."

Samad adds, "Another time upstairs Philmore Hall at Duke and George Streets was so packed, they locked the door, and people throw rope for fellas to climb up."

And in 1943, when Murli Kirpalani decided to organise a musical play to raise funds for famine-stricken India, Ramaya was invited to be a part.

Loosely scripted and produced by Budbir Singh, the proprietor of the India Club, Gulchan Bahar had the best musicians, singers and dancers, including Nazeer Mohammed, Narsaloo Ramaya, Chook Cham, Tarran Singh, Champa Devi, and other local stars.

Samad helped organising performances and Mohan played a saddhu in the first act, and a mendicant in the second act, which climaxed with an emotional song he wrote.

"The tune was from a picture I saw and I composed new lyrics," explains Mohan.

Ramaya adds, "It was a very affecting song which Champa sang with great emotion. People wept. While Champa sang, people went through the aisles with collection bags, which the audience filled generously."

Gulchan Bahar played to packed theatres and halls throughout the island, and with donations raised more than $50,000 to alleviate the suffering of the land that had been left for good.

That was a fortune in those days. The Indians had arrived.

From left. Abdul Samad, John Mohan and Narsaloo Ramaya.

Photo: KIM JOHNSON

Trinidad Guardian

Saturday 31st May 2003

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�

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�April 22, 2002

*The Indian Community in Trinidad:
An Interview with Viranjini Munasinghe*

Viranjini Munasinghe is Associate Professor of Anthropology and Asian
American Studies at Cornell University. Her new book, /Callaloo or
Tossed Salad?: East Indians and the Cultural Politics of Identity in
Trinidad/ (Cornell University Press, 2001), is an historical and
ethnographic study of an Indian community in the Caribbean, with an
emphasis on the politics of cultural conflict between Trinidadians of
Indian and African descent. By redefining the term "creole" to include
the Indo-Trinidadian community, Professor Munasinghe portrays
Indo-Trinidadians as active creators of a unique, hybrid culture.
/AsiaSource/ spoke with the scholar from her office at Cornell University.



*Can you explain the title of your book? Why is food a good metaphor to
discuss the debate between pluralism and homogenization in Trinidad?*

The use of food as metaphor for the nation is not limited to Trinidad
but characteristic of most nationalist discourses. Trinidadians often
use the local West Indian dish "callaloo" as a metaphor for the nation.
This stew, made from the leaves of the dasheen bush and flavored with
okra and coconut milk, serves as a fitting image for their nation
because it conveys both native origins (in the New World) and the
containment of diverse elements within a single unit. However, many
Indo-Trinidadian cultural and political activists I spoke with during my
fieldwork in 1999 and 2000 took exception to this metaphor for the
Trinidad nation. They argued that since the ingredients making up the
"callaloo" are boiled down to an indistinguishable mush, the original
ingredients lose their respective identities and blend into one
homogeneous taste. They disapproved of this metaphor because it
represented an extreme level of blending or "mixture." Instead they
opted for the metaphor of the "tossed salad"--an image which also
signified diversity but one where, unlike the callaloo, each diverse
ingredient maintained its originally distinct and unique identity. Thus
the food metaphors of the callaloo and the tossed salad for the nation
of Trinidad and Tobago convey very different ideas of mixture --
callaloo depicting a process of mixture that produces homogeneity and
tossed salad signifying the co-existence of diverse elements in
pluralism. Indo-Trinidadians who are intent on preserving what they
believe to be their unique and distinct "Indian" identity are against a
"callaloo" nation because of the extent of biological and cultural
mixing signified by this metaphor.

*Can you discuss the historical circumstances of Indian immigration to
Trinidad? When did this movement occur and what factors influenced it?*

When the slaves were emancipated in the British Caribbean in 1838, the
planters looked for alternative supplies of docile and servile labor
that could replace the labor of the former slaves. Planters claimed that
emancipation caused a labor shortage in many of the British Caribbean
colonies such as Trinidad. However, I, along with a host of other
scholars, argue that it was not that labor was in short supply but that
former slaves were no longer willing to labor under the terms offered by
planters. Therefore, planters had to look for a controllable (as opposed
to "free") labor force to work in the sugar plantations.

Some colonies such as Trinidad were particularly well poised to realize
huge profits with increased sugar cultivation because many of their
resources were still unexploited. The planters and the British
Government instituted what some academics such as Hugh Tinker have
labeled "a new system of slavery," or indenture, to provide the planters
with the desired labor. After brief experimentation with different
groups, India, a British colony, became the major source of this
alternative labor supply. India was a suitable source because India's
population was vast, the majority accustomed to agricultural labor under
tropical conditions, and because the country was under British control
there was no need for negotiations with foreign authorities. Living
conditions were also grim for many Indians in the nineteenth century due
to famine, disease, overpopulation and the increasing encroachment of
the East India Company. As a result, many Indians were destitute and
looked to opportunities outside of India in order to improve their
impoverished lives. Between 1845 and 1917 (when indenture was abolished
due to pressure from Indian nationalists) approximately 143,939 Indians
came to Trinidad.

*How and when were differences between South Asian immigrants such as
caste, sect, region, language, and religion collapsed into a singular
?Indo-Trinidadian? identity? Did any of these differences survive?*

While the common perception is that Indian immigrants constituted a
homogenous group because the vast majority who settled in Trinidad came
from the densely populated central plain of the Ganges in northeast
India (the United Provinces, Oudh, Bihar and Orissa), they were in fact
a very diverse group characterized by religious, caste, linguistic and
regional differences. While it is hard to pinpoint a date for the
attenuation of these distinctions, once in Trinidad this originally
diverse population of Indians developed into a relatively homogeneous
group with the emergence of a common language, Bhojpuri, the
standardization of Hinduism, the attenuation of the caste system whereby
only certain distinctions now carried valence, and changes in the family
structure in which certain features of the joint-family structure still
persisted, but in modified form. Religious divisions between Hindus and
Muslims, caste distinctions between Brahmins and Chamars and to a lesser
extent, regional differences between the few "Madrasis" (South Indians)
and the rest of the Indo-Trinidadians whose ancestral origins lie in
northern India, still persist today.

*What role does India play in the Indo-Trinidadian imagination? How much
contact is there between India and the Indo-Trinidadian community? Has
there been travel and exchange in both directions? *

India plays a large role in the Indo-Trinidadian imagination. While
Indo-Trinidadians insist on their commitment and loyalty to the nation
of Trinidad and Tobago, they also express pride in their Indian
ancestry. They don't see these two identities as necessarily in
contradiction.

Identification with India heightened in the 1930s when the independence
movement in India added vigor to the Indo-Trinidadian consciousness. As
early as the 1930s, young Indo-Trinidadian intellectuals began staging
island-wide demonstrations in support of India's demand for freedom.
Public meetings held in Indo-Trinidadian majority areas opened and
closed with Indian patriotic songs and "Vande Matram," the Indian
national anthem. Many of the Indo-Trinidadian organizations formed
during this period, like the India Club, were intent on spreading
knowledge about India and things Indian. Wealthy Indo-Trinidadians
visited India and contributed generously to famine relief funds. Visits
from a host of Indian missionaries and cultural leaders generated new
interest, especially among the Indo-Trinidadian middle class, in the
language and culture of their "mother country." The first Indian movie,
"Bala Joban" was shown to enthralled audiences in Trinidad in 1935.

Contact with India continues today and India as imaginary homeland has
much symbolic import for Indo-Trinidadians. Yet, most Indo-Trinidadians
will emphatically insist on their Trinidadian identity. While the wider
society tends to view Indo-Trinidadian identification with India as a
statement of disloyalty to the nation of Trinidad, Indo-Trinidadians see
it differently. They insist they can be Indian and Trinidadian at the
same time. My book explores why Indian and Trinidadian identities have
historically developed as mutually exclusive identities, and the
strategies through which Indo-Trinidadian cultural activists attempt to
redefine Trinidadian national identity to include Indian elements. The
Indo-Trinidadian dilemma of being viewed as strangers or outsiders in
their society of settlement because of their ancestral culture is quite
typical of how immigrant Asians are viewed generally. Asians, as in the
United States, are often viewed by other groups as unassimilables or as
perpetual strangers because of the unusually heavy cultural baggage
imputed to them.

*Can you discuss the process of creolization? In your book you argue
that Indo-Trinidadians themselves are a product of creolization rather
than inheritors of a strict ancestral culture. Can you explain this?*

Creolization is a concept primarily identified with the Caribbean to
describe and analyze processes of cultural adaptation and change within
deeply hierarchical systems (the plantation/slavery complex and the
race/color hierarchy that accompanied it) whereby new cultural forms
emerged in the New World. A combination of the Spanish words "criar" (to
create, to imagine) and "colon" (a colonist, a founder, a settler), the
term Creole in the British Caribbean refers to people and things that
constitute a mix of elements originating in the Old World. Through this
mix of Old World forms, cultures and people indigenous to the New World
were created. The terms creole and creolization, however, emphasize
primarily the synthesis of African and European Old World elements,
thereby excluding Indians. Thus while those with African and European
ancestry are labeled Creoles, Indo-Trinidadians are never considered to
be Creole. The implications of this exclusion from creole status is
significant for Indo-Trinidadians.

Creolization also implied indigenization whereby foreign elements could
become native to the New World through creative mixings. Thus, all
persons and things ?Creole? signified native status in Trinidad, and by
extension the New World. East Indians who were considered unmixables
because they were thought to be so saturated with an ancient (albeit
inferior) civilization, were as a consequence not accorded Creole or
native status in Trinidad. Thus, Indo-Trinidadians have been
symbolically positioned as outside of the nation of Trinidad before and
since independence in 1962.

My book examines the material and ideological mechanisms through which
Indo-Trinidadians were positioned outside the creolization process and
thereby the Trinidad nation. By examining Indo-Trinidadian practices and
behaviors, I argue that Indo-Trinidadians too can be considered creole
because they are active creators of new cultural forms indigenous to the
New World rather than being mere reproducers of ancestral cultural forms.

*What historical factors contributed to the development of the
Indo-Trinidadian community as distinct and isolated from the larger
Trinidadian population? *

Historically a host of factors functioned to situate East Indians as
separate from the rest of Creole society. Soon after arrival in
Trinidad, Indian indentured laborers were banished to the sugar estates
concentrated in the flatland or rolling hills of the western side of the
island, later known as the sugar belt, thereby subjecting them to
spatial isolation. As indentured laborers they were legally
differentiated from the rest of the population and were subject to a
number of laws that restricted their mobility and hence their contact
with the wider society. Occupationally too, they were confined to the
cultivation and processing of cane. Thus the majority of East Indians
were confined to the rural agricultural sector. Religious and cultural
differences coupled with their inability to speak English, underscored
their alienation from the rest of the population. Symbolically too, East
Indians were represented as outsiders. Since the Indian presence was
thought to be only temporary, very little effort was made by the
colonial government to integrate East Indians into the rest of society.
Even education functioned to separate East Indians. The Canadian
Presbyterian Missions catered exclusively to East Indians and
instruction was in Hindi.

*How does colonial race theory inform contemporary politics on the
island? To what extent is the tension between Trinidadians of Indian and
African descent an inherited legacy of colonialism?*

Colonial policies and racial theories continue to influence contemporary
politics on the island. The division between the two major ethnic groups
comprising Trinidad's population, the Afro-Trinidadian and the
Indo-Trinidadian, which is marked and reproduced by race rhetoric and
ethnic stereotypes with both groups jealously guarding what they believe
to be their legitimate terrain, can be traced to colonial policy. East
Indians were brought to Trinidad as "scab labor" to drive down the
bargaining power of the Afro-Trinidadians. Thus, East Indians from the
beginning occupied a structurally antagonistic position to
Afro-Trinidadians.

Planters were also instrumental in creating particular kinds of
discourses about the character of the "Indian" and the "Negro" in order
to make their case for the need for indentured labor. Caricatures of the
luxury-loving, lazy, immoral Negro and of the docile, hardworking and
cunning Indian abound in planter discourses of the period soon after
emancipation. Many of these derogatory racial stereotypes continue to
this day as the two groups use these same caricatures to undermine one
another. Unfortunately, as is the case with ethnic/racial stereotypes,
these negative racial traits are thought to signify natural
characteristics of the respective groups and the specific colonial
history that led to the creation of such discourse is forgotten or
remains unacknowledged. A major concern in this book is to historically
situate and understand the development of race relations between
Afro-Trinidadians and Indo-Trinidadians and to examine the continuities
and disjunctures between the colonial and postcolonial periods.

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The Wismar Massacre

"I am surprised and amazed that similar action has not been taken at certain areas on the West Coast of Demerar a where murder, rape, arson and intimadation has become the order of the day for the last 14 weeks, and in spite of the declaration of emergency..."
—Forbes Burnham, commenting on the response of the police and government towards�Wismar, which, ironically was very late. May 27, 1964

"From Saturday May 14th to Monday May 26th,
There's no time more glorious
For reflection upon history,
Both great and notorious,
It's all part of the story...
The Guyana way"

"In these times of national crisis, the corporation of all is needed but this cannot be obtained, for there is such glaring evidence of discrimination."
��������—Forbes Burnham, May 27, 1964

“In May 1964, the Negroes at Wismar formed themselves into gangs and went to the business places and homes of the Indians and demanded the keys of the safety boxes and drawers in which they kept their cash, jewellery and other valuable articles. Shortly afterwards, a house at Third Alley was set on fire and soon the whole area became an inferno as the gangs roamed looting, burning and terrorizing the 1,600 Indians as they tried to escape. Every man, woman and child was attacked. The men brutally beaten and the clothes of the women and even girls of tender ages were ripped away. The women and girls were raped in full public view by gangs of men.”—Dwarka Nath, A History of Indian in Guyana.

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