THE INDIANS
Newsday’s Millennium Special
January 1, 2000
Page 18
After
emancipation in 1838, many of the freed slaves withdrew from
labour on the sugar estates.
Looking
for workers to replace them, the planters in Trinidad eventually got the government
in London and the local authorities to adopt a scheme to bring people from
India to work on the plantations.
The
first shipload of 217 Indians arrived in Trinidad on the ‘Fatel Rozack’ on 10th
May 1845. Over the whole period of
immigration (1845-1917) a total of 143,939 people came to Trinidad from India.
The
great majority came from the British Indian provinces along the Ganges river,
especially the United Provinces Bihar and Orissa, while a smaller group came
from South India. Hindi or a variant
(especially Bhojpuri) was their main language and Hinduism their main
religion. A minority were Moslem. Most Indians who emigrated were simple
country folk from traditional communities of village India.
The
Indians entered a system of indentureship, where they had to work on a plantation
for several years, at the end of which they could choose a free treturn passage
to India or a small parcel of land in Trinidad to live on. As Indian children were born in Trinidad and
grew up without any first-hand knowledge of India, more and more Indians
decided to stay. The Indian peasantry
soon developed, growing rice, cocoa, and sugar cane and raising livestock. Children of mixed African and Indian descent
received a special term to identify their ethnicity: the ‘dougla’.
As they
were gradually transformed from immigrant labourers to settlers, the Indians
contributed a great deal to their new society by practicing their rich
diversity of religious and cultural forms.
Temples and mosques were built, Hindu and Moslem festivals were
introduced. Indian dance, music and
song enriched the already complex Trinidad culture, as did Indian cuisine, arts
and crafts.