?Among the Commonwealth heads of government visiting last week, special attention was, understandably, called to India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Dr Singh came to Trinidad and Tobago after a state visit to Washington, DC, where he was the guest of honour on the glittering occasion of President Obama's first state dinner at the White House. The President's choice of India for such eye-catching recognition in the US and around the world accorded with the rise to powerhouse prominence of the world's largest democracy, second most populous country, and its heralded emergence as an economic giant. In T&T, Prime Minister Singh might early be said to have left something behind, making a mark in a T&T described by one New Delhi-based writer as the "little India in the Caribbean."
Dr Singh stressed that his country is eager for the partnership of people of Indian origin in T&T and around the world who, he observed, "have successfully blended Indian culture and values with the local cultural and social environment." He commended that development, fully observable in T&T, as a tribute to "Indianness," which he likened to "a large and all-encompassing banyan tree...(offering) shade to everyone who comes in search of it. It has deep roots at home and branches that in turn go to great distances and strike roots there." Indian roots are well-planted in the T&T soil, which has also fostered cultivation of African heritage and culture, and those of other groups from China, Europe and the Middle East, and mixtures of all the above, now sharing a terrain that once belonged exclusively to the original Amerindians.
It's in "a spirit of live and let live," he said, that India is extending its arms to the world. "In reaching out to people of Indian origin, we are also reaching out to the world at large." Dr Singh obviously recognises that the mother country's natural embrace of people of Indian descent in a place like T&T cannot operate to the exclusion of people of different origins. The call for a special relationship with India is going out to all capable of conceiving and exploring imaginative possibilities in various aspects of this country's ties with the�developing sub-continental superpower. Clearly, this message has already been heard in India. Big industrial players such as Mittal and Essar have sought to exploit T&T downstream investment opportunities, and India's Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) has shown active interest in upstream oil and gas exploration.
At other levels, trade fairs showcasing Indian-manufactured goods have become familiar on the T&T commercial landscape. It was a hitherto unknown Indian firm that came to the rescue of the T&T cricket team, when it was casting about in October for a sponsor of its Twenty/20 expedition in India. India is building a "knowledge economy," a reference that should claim the attention of T&T citizens seeking training in and exposure to tomorrow's digital world of work. Dr Singh directly invited participation in the "investment and business opportunities that India now offers." He also recommended tourism promotion targeted to "people of Indian origin on the US mainland who would be happy to come to these islands for business and holiday." Though speaking to an Indian community audience, Dr Singh's message, promoting the productive potential of business and other ties with India and its diaspora, was addressed to all in T&T who have ears to hear, and the readiness and willingness to grasp opportunities, once identified.