Shas­tri Boodan

Free­lance Cor­re­spon­dent

Hum­ming­bird Gold Medal Awardee De­ok­ien­anan Shar­ma has passed on at the age of 87. Shar­ma served the Na­tion­al Coun­cil of In­di­an Cul­ture (NCIC) for 52 years and re­tired as its pres­i­dent in 2022 be­cause of his ail­ing health.

In an in­ter­view fol­low­ing his re­tire­ment, Shar­ma re­called his decades of ser­vice. Shar­ma’s fa­ther came from In­dia as an in­den­tured labour­er and was versed in San­skrit and In­di­an cul­ture. His fa­ther went on to be­come the sec­ond Dhar­ma­chariya of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha (SDMS).

Shar­ma grew up in Debe, south Trinidad. At the age of 18, he joined the Tu­na­puna-based So­ci­ety of In­di­an Art and Mu­sic (SIAM) and lat­er formed a south­ern branch of this or­gan­i­sa­tion.

Shar­ma was al­so in­volved in the teach­ing of Hin­di in Debe. How­ev­er, when Shar­ma left to go abroad, oth­er mem­bers of the group al­so left the coun­try to study abroad.

“I got my schol­ar­ship, a schol­ar­ship from the Gov­ern­ment of In­dia, which was an IC­CR schol­ar­ship, and I stud­ied en­gi­neer­ing in In­dia and then came back to the UK to com­plete my stud­ies in en­gi­neer­ing. While I was on the boat com­ing back from Mum­bai (In­dia) to South Hamp­ton (Unit­ed King­dom) T&T was de­clared in­de­pen­dent. Up to that point, I was con­sid­ered a British cit­i­zen; I thought I was, but by the time I reached Lon­don, I was no longer a British cit­i­zen.”

Shar­ma said his orig­i­nal in­ten­tions were to work and study in the UK. How­ev­er, jobs were dif­fi­cult to get, and he re­turned to T&T in 1962 when win­ter start­ed.

In T&T, his de­gree from In­dia was not recog­nised by the Gov­ern­ment. He worked for some time and ap­plied for a schol­ar­ship to pur­sue a mas­ter’s de­gree at a Unit­ed States uni­ver­si­ty.

In 1966, the Gov­ern­ment of T&T de­clared Di­vali a na­tion­al hol­i­day. Shar­ma re­called be­ing in­vit­ed by Bhadase Sagan Ma­haraj, the then-head of the SDMS, to be part of the or­gan­is­ing com­mit­tee to host cel­e­bra­tions.

“We or­gan­ised Di­vali cel­e­bra­tions at Gopaul Lands in Mara­bel­la for three straight years.”

He said Di­vali Na­gar was or­gan­ised in 1986 at the Mid Cen­tre Mall, Ch­agua­nas, and was de­signed to at­tract the at­ten­tion of T&T and bring greater aware­ness to In­di­an cul­ture at a na­tion­al lev­el.

Shar­ma was in­volved with the Na­gar from its in­cep­tion to his de­par­ture, hav­ing run the Na­gar for 20 of the 35 years he had been in­volved.

Shar­ma re­ceived sev­er­al awards from var­i­ous or­gan­i­sa­tions, in­clud­ing the In­di­an High Com­mis­sion. He had said while In­di­an cul­ture has grown and de­vel­oped in var­i­ous spheres, “there is still a lot more to be done.” 

Mean­while, Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar paid trib­ute to a “na­tion-builder.” In a state­ment yes­ter­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, “Dr Shar­ma was a ma­jor pi­o­neer and pil­lar of na­tion­al cul­ture. He sig­nif­i­cant­ly ex­pand­ed our cul­tur­al land­scape and helped re­de­fine Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cul­ture to be more in­clu­sive of the many forms that ex­ist in our mul­ti­fac­eted and mul­ti­lay­ered so­ci­ety.

“In his great, in­spir­ing life, Dr Shar­ma, who came from a fam­i­ly of Pun­dits, was a beloved Hin­du spir­i­tu­al leader, gu­ru, aca­d­e­m­ic, schol­ar, and cul­tur­al colos­sus for over sev­en decades, in­flu­enc­ing thou­sands of cit­i­zens di­rect­ly and in­di­rect­ly for gen­er­a­tions.”

Op­po­si­tion Leader pays trib­ute to a na­tion-builder

Mean­while, Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar paid trib­ute to a "na­tion-builder." In a state­ment yes­ter­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, "Dr Shar­ma was a ma­jor pi­o­neer and pil­lar of na­tion­al cul­ture. He sig­nif­i­cant­ly ex­pand­ed our cul­tur­al land­scape and helped re­de­fine Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cul­ture to be more in­clu­sive of the many forms that ex­ist in our mul­ti­fac­eted and mul­ti­lay­ered so­ci­ety.

"In his great, in­spir­ing life, Dr Shar­ma, who came from a fam­i­ly of Pun­dits, was a beloved Hin­du spir­i­tu­al leader, gu­ru, aca­d­e­m­ic, schol­ar, and cul­tur­al colos­sus for over sev­en decades, in­flu­enc­ing thou­sands of cit­i­zens di­rect­ly and in­di­rect­ly for gen­er­a­tions."