Ken Ali

Di­vali Na­gar is ar­guably the largest re­li­gious fes­ti­val in Trinidad and To­ba­go. The week-long af­fair is pre­sent­ed by the Na­tion­al Coun­cil of In­di­an Cul­ture (NCIC) in the week lead­ing up to the an­nu­al Hin­du ob­ser­vance of Di­vali. The free ex­hi­bi­tion of mu­sic, dance, art, with Ori­en­tal cui­sine, at­tracts thou­sands each night at its site on the out­skirts of the town cen­tre of Ch­agua­nas. To­ward the end of a hec­tic week, De­ok­i­nanan Shar­ma, the long-serv­ing pres­i­dent of NCIC, spared some time to dis­cuss the event.

Q:How has the an­nu­al Di­vali Na­gar fes­ti­val pro­mot­ed the ideals of Hin­duism?

A: It has done so through the medi­um of the ex­hi­bi­tion that we present each year. We put up an as­pect of In­di­an cul­ture and es­pe­cial­ly of Hin­duism. We have done so since the in­cep­tion of the Na­gar. About ten years ago, we em­ployed the ser­vices of some­one from Mum­bai, In­dia, who put to­geth­er the ex­hi­bi­tion af­ter do­ing the re­search along with oth­er ex­perts from his city. He has put to­geth­er ex­hi­bi­tions whose for­mats have been quite stun­ning and he goes in­to fair­ly good depth in as­pects of Hin­duism ap­pro­pri­ate to the cho­sen theme of the par­tic­u­lar year.

You have crit­i­cised the Gov­ern­ment over fund­ing of the Na­gar. Can you pro­vide de­tails?

Our fund­ing comes from the Min­istry of Cul­ture and amounts to small amounts. Over the past two years, the sum has dwin­dled by con­sid­er­able amounts. Last year the fund­ing de­clined by be­tween 40 and 50 per cent; this year there was an­oth­er 30 per cent cut. I don't know whether this trend will con­tin­ue. I hope the Min­istry sees the val­ue of the Na­gar to the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty and re­vers­es its trend. I look for­ward very much to that.

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What do you say to crit­ics who com­plain of the com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion of the Na­gar?

We just have to live with the crit­i­cism. I have ex­plained on stage, time and again, that with­out rental of the booths, it would be dif­fi­cult to stage the Na­gar in the grandiose man­ner in which it is staged. The com­mer­cial area al­so pro­vides em­ploy­ment and helps out peo­ple gen­er­al­ly. It is a pos­i­tive fea­ture. Those are the plain facts.

Is Hin­duism on the rise in T&T?

I may not be the most ap­pro­pri­ate per­son to an­swer this. I do not have sta­tis­tics to back this up, but it ap­pears that re­li­gion is gen­er­al­ly con­sol­i­dat­ing, with more and more peo­ple go­ing in­to their re­li­gions and prac­tis­ing their faiths, es­pe­cial­ly with the state of our na­tion to­day. With re­spect to In­di­an cul­ture and Hin­duism, some peo­ple point to crossover mu­sic bands, say­ing they are di­lut­ing the cul­ture. I hope we would not lose our tra­di­tion­al cul­ture. I hope it would be pre­served and main­tained.

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Is Hin­duism los­ing out to full-gospel church­es?

Again, you are ask­ing this of the wrong per­son. Our cul­ture is grow­ing and our faith is be­ing prop­a­gat­ed. But in a so­ci­ety like ours, you can ex­pect that there would be crossover in wor­ship. That would not be un­usu­al. I do not feel, though, that Hin­duism is be­ing af­fect­ed.

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Are youth be­ing at­tract­ed to the faith in large num­bers?

I would think so. Al­though some pro­mote In­di­an cul­ture and Hin­duism sep­a­rate­ly, it is dif­fi­cult to sep­a­rate the cul­ture and Hin­duism, and more and more youth are in­volved in the cul­ture. You could see ev­i­dence of this every­where. Just look around. So, it is clear that the cul­ture is in good hands, and, of course, the cul­ture is linked to the re­li­gion. So, I feel there is a strong pres­ence of youth in the Hin­du faith.

While US Pres­i­dent Barack Oba­ma host­ed a Di­vali func­tion at the White House, there has been no of­fi­cial event by the T&T Gov­ern­ment. Does this up­set you?

Yes, we won­der why this is so. A few years ago there was a Di­vali func­tion at the Prime Min­is­ter's res­i­dence. We do not know why there are no more such func­tions. We have no idea why this was stopped. Christ­mas is still cel­e­brat­ed, I think. We are all part of the na­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go. I think it should be re­in­stat­ed. If this is done, it would send a pos­i­tive mes­sage to the na­tion from the top.

Is dis­uni­ty among Hin­du lead­ers af­fect­ing the faith­ful?

It seems that dis­uni­ty is part of the In­di­an psy­che, and we just have to deal with that. We have tried from time to time to bring the groups to­geth­er as one body; we have not suc­ceed­ed. Sev­er­al peo­ple have been in­volved in that ex­er­cise. Ef­forts would con­tin­ue to be made. We hope that at some time there would be an um­brel­la body to deal with is­sues fac­ing the Hin­du com­mu­ni­ty. We would not stop our ef­forts and we look for­ward to achiev­ing our de­sired goal. On the oth­er hand, there are good rea­sons for what ap­pears to be dis­uni­ty. There are dif­fer­ent strands of Hin­du cul­ture, and this has led to var­i­ous per­spec­tives. We have to be fair and look at things from all sides.

What was your mes­sage to the Na­gar this year?

I spoke of the Hin­du con­cept of God. Hin­dus be­lieve that each in­di­vid­ual is a part of The Di­vin­i­ty, a part of a supreme soul and we are all di­vine in na­ture. This is es­pe­cial­ly so of good souls. Our out­look would change if we all ac­cept that we are part of the di­vine. It would as­sist with re­spect to things af­fect­ing the coun­try if we all see the good in each oth­er. I re­quest that every­one sees the di­vine in each oth­er. That was my mes­sage.

What is the fond­est mem­o­ry you are tak­ing from this year's edi­tion of Di­vali Na­gar?

It is the im­age of thou­sands of peo­ple of all races and class­es com­ing to­geth­er at a func­tion with no al­co­hol and meat. Al­so, the sight of so many peo­ple and no se­ri­ous in­ci­dents is an­oth­er high point. I do not re­call any ma­jor in­ci­dents ever tak­ing place. On the clos­ing night, there were more than 30,000 peo­ple present and their be­hav­iour was ex­em­plary. It proves that we are ca­pa­ble of ap­pro­pri­ate be­hav­iour. I hope this per­me­ates through­out the year. The Na­gar pro­motes a whole­some at­mos­phere and is en­joyed by so many peo­ple. That makes me hap­py.

How much of your time does the Na­gar take?

Oh, I spend most of my time there. But I en­joy it all.