?Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley has cit­ed Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar as he spoke of In­di­an Ar­rival Day.

Row­ley said this year's ob­ser­vance of In­di­an Ar­rival Day was "even more poignant by the fact that, just a few days ago, an off­spring of in­den­ture­ship was sworn in as the first fe­male Prime Min­is­ter of T&T."

Row­ley de­scribed the strug­gle of the East In­di­an in­den­tured labour­ers who came to this coun­try 165 years ago, as one of "re­mark­able hero­ism. It is an ex­tra­or­di­nary sto­ry of sim­ple peo­ple." Row­ley said the East In­di­an com­mu­ni­ty, "faced with a strange and op­pres­sive en­vi­ron­ment and with chal­lenges that ac­cen­tu­at­ed their vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty, they shaped their lives vir­tu­al­ly from scratch."

He said on the ob­ser­vance of In­di­an Ar­rival Day, "we must al­so re­mem­ber the ar­rival all oth­ers who came from dis­tant shores and who made equal­ly piv­otal and in­spir­ing con­tri­bu­tions to the de­vel­op­ment of the so­ci­ety."