Will Guyana settle for merely ‘Arrival Day’ or secure a certain ‘Indian Arrival Day’?

May 05, 2024 Letters

Dear Editor,

April month reflected a tapestry of religious holidays enjoyed by all religions and races in Guyana. From the dawning of May month, Guyanese are again pampered with three significant public holidays showcasing the political, cultural and historical making of a nation which has fought employers for the recognition of industrial representation for employees, the colonialists for relinquishing the bondage of indentureship, and the British Empire for the granting of independence.

Labour Day was celebrated on May 1st, Independence Day will be observed on the 26th and the controversy of Arrival Day’s redress is scheduled for May 5th.

Incidentally or intentionally, the PPP/C 32nd Congress is being held the very holiday weekend to coincide with the ceremonial Arrival Day activities. A country of six original races, five have specific periods to recognise and commensurate their arrival while the largest ethnicity, the Indo-Guyanese, is still in limbo. Will the problematic question of acknowledgement, recognition and acceptance identify itself on the agenda at the Congress? Perhaps this shunned item will not surface to create any dilemma, distress or discomfort.

Ryan Jobson, an anthropologist in Chicago, wrote in 2019, “Since 1492, the Caribbean has been the object of distorted modes of representation.” Perhaps, sceptics may classify the Indians’ conundrum in this category and its resolution may continue to remain in quandary. This gray area of disconnect is quite disturbing and Guyanese are dismayed at its quiet treatment as it is swept under the rug with a long shelf life. Maybe, the real value of Indian contribution has gained more traction externally than internally. We are constantly reminded and cannot forget George Lamming’s writing in 1966, “Those Indian hands whether in British Guiana or Trinidad have fed all of us. They are, perhaps, our only jewels of a true native thrift and industry. They have taught us by example, the value of money; for they respect money as only people with a high sense of communal responsibility can.”

On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, our neighbour, Trinidad and Tobago, did not hesitate and remains firm in fixing May 30th as Indian Arrival Day, a national holiday. Across our Eastern border, Suriname celebrates Indian Arrival Day as a public holiday on June 5th. A quick look at other sister Caribbean islands confirm that our CARICOM counterparts celebrate Indian Arrival Day as follows: Grenada – May 1st, St. Lucia – May 6th, Jamaica – May 10th and St. Vincent and the Grenadines – June 1st. Barbados did not participate in indentureship. Guyana has retracted on declaring May 5th as Indian Arrival Day.

It was Sir Walter Raleigh who influenced Europeans to come to Guyana (Guiana), describing (The Discovery of Guiana), this land of many waters as, “hills with stones of the colour of gold and silver…an undoubted assurance of the general abundance.” In the NY Times Business Day July 2018 article, Guyana was featured as a “vast, watery wilderness” where children “play naked in the muggy heat.” The coastal capital of Georgetown is written off as a “musty clapboard town” that “seems forgotten by time.”

From being marginalised as the second poorest nation in the Caribbean to being mainstream as a vying oil producing nation with the richest GDP per capita, Ryan Jobson sums up, “It is not the passage of time that has forgotten Guyana. Rather, it is the legacies of racial slavery and indenture that entrenched racial difference and preserved the underdevelopment of Guyanese society. He explained, “Burnhamism thrived as a political ideology in which public resources were pilfered by the political elites of the PNC.”

Such is the country that generations of Indo-Guyanese survive in after trailing a line of ancestors who arrived as indentured labourers from North India, especially the Bhojpur and Awadh regions of the Hindi Belt in the present-day states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand. Many also came from a lineage that migrated from the South Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. Between 1838 -1917, some 238,909 immigrants arrived while 75,547 returned after serving their contracts known as girmit.

The remaining choose to stay and make then British Guiana their new home. Many died from tropical diseases, especially yellow fever and malaria. Living conditions were far from being comfortable and contrary to what they were led to believe. They were also fooled by their own who acted as recruiters. Joseph Beaumont described indenture as “a new system of slavery.” The anti-indentureship protests continued throughout India until the British Imperial Government and the Government of India had to give in to the pressure to end the system and on 1 January 1920, it was abolished completely.

The East Indians, who were primarily Hindus and Muslims, brought their own culture. They introduced a new way of life and learnt to survive despite being away from and without what they were accustomed to. The East Indians trended new fashions and clothing such as the sari, choli, kurtah, orhni, salwar kameez, garara, dupatta, gangri, pagri, and dhoti. Jewellery included the nakphul, bera, churia, and baju band, among others. Their foods included roties: sada, paratha, dosti, aloo and dhalpourie; fruits and vegetables: baigan, dhal, carila, bhaat (cooked rice). Nariel (coconut), damadol (tomatoes) and tarkaree (cooked vegetables); delicacies: khurma, peera, ladoo, goolab jamoon, jellaby, goolgoolah, sirnee and prashad. A new set of utensils accompanied them: tawa, belna, chauki, dabila, chulah, pukni, chimta, karahi, saphee, dhall ghotni, okhri, musar, sil and lorha. Music and dance provided entertainment with instruments such as: tassa, tabla, dholak, majeera, dhantal, bansoori, sitar and harmonium. They never forgot their customs and traditions and the festivals of Phagwah, Diwali, Ramadan and Eid became popular. Their weddings and religious activities were spectacular.

Referred to as “coolies,” the Indians were secluded on the estates in the logies while serving the colonial masters as sugar workers with their blood, sweat and tears. Tired of this isolation, those who remained after completing their contracts, broke free and started to build settlements away from the estates. They first went to Helena in 1896, then to Whim in 1898 and then to Bush Lot. Their economic freedom was established by commencing humbly as peasant farming, graduating to rice cultivation and agricultural farming such as planting vegetables, coconuts, coffee and fruit trees. It was a slow but sure transformation from coolie as a consumer and customer to coolie as a commercial counterpart. But they were always denied a place at the table and had to convert to Christianity in order to avoid censorship.

This competition posed a challenge and the Indian contributions were diluted, ignored or unacknowledged. Dr. Cheddi Jagan reminded his audience in NY at the 150th anniversary of the arrival of East Indians in the Caribbean, “It is short-sighted to see the ‘Caribbean man’ only as a ‘Blackman’ and the Caribbean Culture as African Culture.”

A former West Indies cricket captain created chaos when he referred to the West Indies team as “African.” During the Burnham era, CARICOM leaders behaved as if “Caribbean East Indians either do not exist or are below the competence of the African majority segment of the society.” Now the table has turned with the robust emergence of forceful Indian leaders in Trinidad, Guyana and Suriname who have forged a change of heart. A former Prime Minister of T&T, Basdeo Pandey, had advocated for the equal treatment of Indians saying, “We must realise that Indians cannot get justice in isolation from the rest of the society.” Will Guyana settle for merely ‘Arrival Day’ or secure a certain ‘Indian Arrival Day?’

Latest News