Barackpore tassa drummer Sieudass Ramparidath was found dead in a lagoon at the back of his home at Cunjal Road South on Wednesday.
His family does not suspect foul play, but police investigations are still ongoing and an autopsy will be conducted to determine his cause of death.
Ramparidath, 45, lived with his cousin Paul Ramnath, who last saw him on Wednesday morning before he (Ramnath) left for work.
According to a police report, Ramparidath was later seen by children from the village near the lagoon, which is about 200 feet to the back of his house and he told them he was going fishing. However, his body was found around 6.30 pm.
At his Barrackpore home yesterday, relatives were preparing for his wake.
Ramnath told Guardian Media that his cousin drank a lot of alcohol and suffered from seizures.
Recalling that when he returned home around 5 pm his cousin was not home, he said, “I check all the neighbours and thing because I know he does move about. When I gone he not nowhere around. I decide to look but them lil children say they see him in the lagoon catching fish. He can’t get no fish there. I decide to take a (torch)light and go and look, the place was dark.”
He said when he found him he was lying face-up in about an inch of water.
He believes that Ramparidath was walking along a track which led to their relatives’ homes but lost his balance and fell into the lagoon.
“He can’t go there to catch fish, the grass so high. He just drunk and he miss that track and fall in the lagoon and catch the fits,” he said.
Rampadirath, he added, was a well-known “tassaman” in the community.
“He was a very good person. He was not a violent person. Everybody around here know him very well and he good with everybody,” he said.
Rampadirath was not married and had no children. Police said the body bore no visible marks of violence.
The body was removed to the San Fernando General Hospital mortuary but the autopsy is expected to be done at the Forensic Science Centre in Port-of-Spain.
PC Silochan, of the Barrackpore Police Station, is investigating.
