Sat Ma­haraj

T&T is this year cel­e­brat­ing its 50th an­niver­sary as an in­de­pen­dent na­tion. A re­birth from slav­ery and in­den­ture­ship, pe­ri­ods in his­to­ry that present a bit­ter-sweet sce­nario. Had this not hap­pened, we would not have been here to­day as a twin-is­land re­pub­lic with the mem­o­ries and im­ages of the hard­ships of our an­ces­tors that haunt us even now.

On May 30, In­di­an Ar­rival Day will be cel­e­brat­ed to com­mem­o­rate the first ar­rivals from the In­di­an sub­con­ti­nent to Trinidad in 1845 aboard the ship SS Fa­tel Raza­ck. From 1845 to 1917, ap­prox­i­mate­ly 130,000 im­mi­grant labour­ers, the ma­jor­i­ty Hin­dus, came from In­dia. This year's cel­e­bra­tion marks 167 years since the first ar­rival of In­di­ans.

In­di­an Ar­rival Day was first cel­e­brat­ed at Skin­ner Park, San Fer­nan­do, as the East In­di­an cen- tenary on May 30, 1945. This marked the hun­dredth an­niver­sary of the com­ing of In­di­ans to Trinidad. The act­ing gov­er­nor, rep­re­sent­ing the Gov­ern­ment of the Unit­ed King­dom, at­tend­ed, in­di­cat­ing the sig­nif­i­cance of the ob­ser­vance.

Oth­er lo­cal dig­ni­taries who ad­dressed the large crowd in­clud­ed Tim­o­thy Roodal, George Fitz­patrick, Adri­an Co­la Rien­zi, and Murli J Kir­palani. Greet­ings were al­so read from Ma­hat­ma Gand­hi, Lord Wavell and Col Stan­ley, the Sec­re­tary of State for the Co­lo-nies. Gand­hi sub­se­quent­ly died in 1948, three years af­ter this his­toric event.

The In­di­an com­mu­ni­ty in T&T has shaped, mold­ed, carved and built it­self around the idea of pro-gress. But names such as Sar­ran Teelucks­ingh, Tim­o­thy Roodal, Adri­an Co­la Rien­zi, Bhadase Sagan Maraj and Rudranath Ca-pildeo are sel­dom re­mem­bered by to­day's gen­er­a­tion.

The fruits of their labour, how­ev­er, have on­ly tru­ly ma­te­ri­alised post-in­de­pen­dence and thus in this the 50th year of in­de­pen­dence re­flec­tion on the progress of the In­di­an com­mu­ni­ty in T&T must form a part of our cel­e­bra­tions. The Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha still stands as the largest and old­est Hin­du or­gan­i­sa­tion in the Caribbean.

Oth­er In­do-cen­tred re­li­gious bod­ies have or­gan­ised them­selves in­to suc­cess­ful or­gan­i­sa­tions such as AS­JA (An­ju­man Sun­nat-ul-Ja­maat As­so­ci­a­tion) rep­re­sent­ing the Mus­lims and the Pres­by­ter­ian group which com­pris­es main­ly East In­di­an Chris­tians. The San­skrit chant "Sanghe Shak­ti Kali Yuge" says "in Kaliyuge (last/dark age), or­gan­i­sa­tion is pow­er."

Or­gan­i­sa­tions that have been es­tab­lished here in T&T from with­in it­self have formed the very pil­lar and sup­port of the fol­low­ers they lead. To­day we have our own In­di­an Caribbean Mu­se­um, an in­sti­tu­tion ded­i­cat­ed to the preser­va­tion of In­di­an cul­ture.

Housed in Wa­ter­loo, Cara­pi-chi­ma, the mem­bers com­pris­ing the board of the mu­se­um are of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha, AS­JA and the Pres­by­ter­ian Board. Un­der these or­gan­i­sa­tions, mul­ti­ple schools and places of wor­ship have been es­tab­lished. To date the SDMS has un­der its pur-view over 60 schools (ear­ly child care cen­tres, pri­ma­ry and sec­ondary). None of these schools look or func­tion like a "cow shed" as they were de­scribed dur­ing the reign of Dr Er­ic Williams.

The prop­er­ties on which these in­sti­tu­tions stand have been ac­quired and owned by these bod­ies. The build­ings have been built by the re­spec­tive com­mu­ni­ties in which they are housed. Fund-rais­ings, do­na­tions and hard work of the vil­lagers, par­ents and chil­dren of these com­mu­ni­ties have been the foun­da­tion for these mod­ern build­ings.

The re­cent court judg­ment of Jus­tice Ven­tour in the mat­ter of Kam­la Jages­sar v Teach­ing Ser­vice Com­mis­sion un­der­scores this point. No rouge el­e­ment will dic­tate to us how our af­fairs are to be con­duct­ed. Aca­d­e­m­i­cal­ly, our chil­dren are achiev­ing the high­est marks not on­ly in T&T but in the Caribbean and even world­wide. Our places of wor­ship are al­ways well at­tend­ed and in the last 50 years cul­tur­al aware­ness has height­ened.

With­in the schools this is al­so an im­por­tant as­pect as cul­ture and re­li­gion re­main fo­cal points for the chil­dren. Many of our chil­dren have sur­passed the ex­pec­ta­tions of the na­tion­al syl­labus and cur­ricu­lum and are able to mul­ti-task and ex­cel in all ar­eas.

Even at the ter­tiary lev­el, ex­cel­lence is al­so be­ing achieved. In the var­i­ous fields of work there is al­so an over­whelm­ing suc­cess rate. To­day we see the ac­com­plish­ment of Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, who has as­cend­ed to the high­est par­lia­men­tary of­fice in T&T. This re­al­i­ty speaks to the fact that we have achieved in every pro­fes­sion in which we po­si­tion our­selves.

We have achieved as a peo­ple and a com­mu­ni­ty de­spite ad­ver­si­ty, dis­crim­i­na­tion, vic­tim­i­sa­tion and in­jus­tice. We have learnt to re­ly on self and on hard work and progress. This is what has sus­tained the In­di­an di­as­po­ra, not on­ly in T&T but around the world. It is through ed­u­ca­tion and per­sis­tence that our present re­al­ism is fruit­ful and flour­ish­ing for our chil­dren to en­joy.

Fifty years post-in­de­pen­dence and 167 years since our an­ces­tors' ar­rival have seen a re­shap­ing of the cane cut­ters in­to the pro­fes­sion­als of to­day. Ma­hat­ma Gand­hi in his words of wis­dom to the world said: "There will have to be rigid and iron dis­ci­pline be­fore we achieve any­thing great and en­dur­ing, and that dis­ci­pline will not come by mere aca­d­e­m­ic ar­gu­ment and ap­peal to rea­son and log­ic. Dis­ci­pline is learnt in the school of ad­ver­si­ty."

• Sat­narayan Ma­haraj is the sec­re­tary gen­er­al of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha