RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

A moth­er’s grief be­came a source of strength on the in­ter­na­tion­al dance stage as Fazi­da Be­har­ry ded­i­cat­ed two in­ter­na­tion­al ti­tles in Italy to her late daugh­ter, whose pas­sion for dance con­tin­ues to in­spire her.

Be­har­ry, of the Trinidad Mul­ti­cul­tur­al Dance Group, se­cured first place in both Bol­ly­wood and In­di­an Clas­si­cal Dance at the In­ter­na­tion­al Open Dance Com­pe­ti­tion in Berg­amo, Italy, held from Oc­to­ber 23 to 25.

The dou­ble vic­to­ry has al­so qual­i­fied the group for the World Cham­pi­onship in Lon­don ear­ly next year.

But for Be­har­ry, the achieve­ment was about much more than tro­phies and medals. It was a trib­ute to her daugh­ter, Jed­da Sasskia Be­har­ry, whose un­ex­pect­ed death on Au­gust 14 left her fam­i­ly and the lo­cal dance com­mu­ni­ty mourn­ing.

Speak­ing about the achieve­ment, Be­har­ry said the vic­to­ries were ded­i­cat­ed to Jed­da, who had been an in­te­gral part of their dance jour­ney.

She said that al­though Jed­da was no longer phys­i­cal­ly present, her spir­it re­mained with them through every per­for­mance and achieve­ment.

“These wins are ded­i­cat­ed to our beloved Jed­da Sasskia Be­har­ry,” she said.

“Jed­da, you may no longer stand be­side us phys­i­cal­ly, but your pres­ence re­mains wo­ven in­to every move­ment, every per­for­mance and every achieve­ment.”

Be­har­ry said her daugh­ter’s love, pas­sion and ded­i­ca­tion to dance would for­ev­er re­main in their hearts.

“Every step we take is a re­minder that love nev­er dies, dreams nev­er fade, and the lega­cy of those we cher­ish con­tin­ues to live through us,” she said.

Jed­da died af­ter re­port­ed­ly be­com­ing ill while at a res­i­dence in Ben Lomond Vil­lage, Gas­par­il­lo, on Au­gust 14.

Ac­cord­ing to po­lice, she sub­se­quent­ly ex­pe­ri­enced dif­fi­cul­ty breath­ing and com­plained of sud­den chest pains. Emer­gency as­sis­tance was sought and CPR was at­tempt­ed be­fore she was tak­en to the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal, where she was pro­nounced dead.

Fol­low­ing a post-mortem ex­am­i­na­tion, blood and oth­er sam­ples were sub­mit­ted to the Foren­sic Sci­ence Cen­tre for fur­ther analy­sis.

Jed­da be­gan danc­ing at the age of five when she par­tic­i­pat­ed in Mas­tana Ba­har.

She went on to com­pete in In­di­an dance com­pe­ti­tions and rep­re­sent­ed Trinidad and To­ba­go at re­gion­al events, in­clud­ing trav­el­ling to Pana­ma with her moth­er in 2024.

A mem­ber of the Trinidad Mul­ti­cul­tur­al Dance Com­pa­ny, she was known for per­form­ing tra­di­tion­al Bol­ly­wood and clas­si­cal dance while in­cor­po­rat­ing con­tem­po­rary in­flu­ences in­to her rou­tines.

She al­so shared her pas­sion by teach­ing dance in Gas­par­il­lo and was a stu­dent of the School of In­ter­na­tion­al Trav­el and Lan­guages (SITAL).

With the World Cham­pi­onship in Lon­don ahead, Be­har­ry said their group will con­tin­ue to car­ry Jed­da’s mem­o­ry on­to the in­ter­na­tion­al stage.

“Rest in heav­en­ly peace, Jed­da. This vic­to­ry is yours too. Un­til we dance to­geth­er again,” Be­har­ry said.