RALPH BAN­WARIE

Free­lance Con­trib­u­tor

San­gre Grande Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion’s (SGRC) Di­vali cel­e­bra­tion, the biggest ever in the East­ern town, came to an abrupt end when po­lice moved in, stat­ing that the time ap­proved for the pro­gramme had ex­pired.

The street pa­rade was sched­uled to be­gin at 5 pm and end at 6 pm, but no time was al­lo­cat­ed for the cul­tur­al pro­gramme, which on­ly start­ed around 7 pm. It came to a pre­ma­ture halt at ap­prox­i­mate­ly 8.45 pm when po­lice ad­vised chair­man of the SGRC, Ken­wyn Phillip, that the show must end.

Sources in­formed Guardian Me­dia that the Rio Claro pro­gramme, how­ev­er, con­tin­ued well in­to the night, con­clud­ing at 11.30 pm.

Phillip, Vice Chair­man Nas­sar Ho­sein, the pro­gramme’s MC, and the hun­dreds of at­ten­dees were very dis­ap­point­ed by the po­lice in­ter­ven­tion. Many voiced their frus­tra­tion, say­ing the po­lice should have al­lowed time for the pro­gramme to con­clude, as it is a once-a-year cel­e­bra­tion.

“They have put us in the dark, we were now be­gin­ning to en­joy the pro­gramme,” said up­set res­i­dents, when the an­nounce­ment came that the pro­gramme had to end, ac­cord­ing to in­struc­tions from Ag Sgt Hanooman.

Phillip apol­o­gised to the pub­lic and promised that the 2026 cel­e­bra­tion would be big­ger and bet­ter. He al­so thanked Gary Ma­habir of New York, as well as all oth­ers who con­tributed to the pro­gramme’s suc­cess, not­ing that not one cent from the cor­po­ra­tion fund was used for the event.

Res­i­dents de­scribed it as “the biggest and well-planned pro­gramme for years put on by SGRC”. Many said that for those un­able to at­tend Di­vali Na­gar, this event be­came their Na­gar, and they were en­joy­ing every part of the pro­gramme.

The cel­e­bra­tion fea­tured mu­sic by RAVE In­di­an Or­ches­tra, songs from var­i­ous groups, dances from Shar­main Dance Group and Ve­na’s School of Dance, as well as steel­pan and oth­er in­stru­men­tal per­for­mances.

In­di­an food, soft drinks, and del­i­ca­cies were dis­trib­uted to at­ten­dees. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, res­i­dents were on­ly able to en­joy part of the pro­gramme.