Lincoln Lewis on Pres. Ali and emancipation celebration

Aug 07, 2024 Letters

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Dear Editor,

As I read Lincoln Lewis’s letter “President Ali, and his cohorts, using State privilege and resources to miniaturize the Africans’ Day of Emancipation was quite distressing” (Stabroek News, August 5, 2024). I am reminded of the expression “now the shoe is on the other foot”.

In his letter he states, “President Ali and his cohorts (are) using State privilege and resources to desecrate events Africans hold sacred.  Emancipation is one such.” Well, if Mr. Lewis does not know or has forgotten, he may wish to review relevant editions of the national newspapers during the presidencies of President Burnham and President Granger to realize that President Ali is following cross cultural precedent set by his predecessors.

Commencing early in his presidency, at times of the Hindu festival of Phagwah or Holi, Mr. Burnham would invite to his Belfield residence a group of Indo-Guyanese women from the nearby village of Nootenzuil to cook phulowrie for his hundreds of Hindu and other guests, all dressed in white, to celebrate this festival. As Hindu chowtaal groups provide the entertainment, the celebrants, including President Burnham, would have a jolly time dousing one another with colourful powders and sprinkling of magenta-coloured water.

Similarly, President David Granger also carried out a celebration of sorts although on a less extravagant scale at State House, Georgetown. In a March 2, 2018 article

“Hindu festivals help to foster cohesion – President Granger”, Guyana Times writes “President David Granger on Thursday asserted that festivals like Phagwah assist in the fostering of social cohesion in Guyana. This remark was made during a chowtaal session and pre-Holi celebrations hosted at State House on Thursday in the company of Cabinet members and other significant representatives of the Hindu society. The event featured performances from many dancers and singers who entertained the gathering.”

Further Lewis writes “Freedom is not denying IDPADA-G state funding to function in a manner that would empower African Guyanese then creating a rival organisation that takes political directives and reduces Africans’ worth to frivolity by solely engaging in merriment”. Once again, the PPP seems to have taken a page from the PNC playbook. In 1969, a coup was engineered by the PNC and few Executive members of the Guyana Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha (GSDMS), the largest Hindu organization in the country at the time, to prevent Pandit Reepu Daman Persaud from being elected President of the organization, and elect Mr. Sase Narain instead. Shortly thereafter, Sase Narain was elected by the PNC as Speaker of Parliament, a position he held from 1971 until the defeat of the PNC in 1992, often ruling against the PPP and treating Dr. Jagan, the PPP leader, with disdain.

This was the period when two Diwali fairs were held, one by the Mahatma Gandhi Organization, the General Secretary of which was Dr Balwant Singh, someone who had ran afoul of President Burnham, and the other by the GSDMS which was headed by Mr. Sase Narain and supported by Ms. Rajkumari Singh. Interestingly, one year a member of Rajkumari’s Messenger Group who was an ardent PNC supporter at the time, Ms. Mahadai Das, was crowned Miss Diwali Queen at the GSDMS fair. As recorded in his book on Alice Bhagwandai Singh, mother of Rajkumari, both Rajkumari and Mahadai were on the staff of the Guyana National Service. This programme, I was told by a participant in the planning and research of locations in the interior, was initiated with the support of Mr. Sase Narain and Ms. Rajkumari Singh.

That coup in the GSDMS marked the fracturing and rapid decline of this historical and once powerful Hindu organization and led, few years later, to the formation of the Dharmic Sabha, headed initially by Pandit Reepu Daman Persaud and now by his daughter Dr. Vindhya Persaud. Even worse was the prior happening in the Hindu Pandits’ Council, a Council of Hindu priests drawn from the Brahmin caste and closely associated with the GSDMS. To appease the Brahmin priests for their support and give them exclusive legal right to the priesthood, the PNC Government passed a law in 1967 (Act No. 13 of 1967) defining a pandit as a Brahmin. This meant that priests from other Hindu denominations, e.g. the Arya Samaj, could not be recognized legally as priests. Also, a President of the Council was later appointed as a Government Minister. Although enforcement of this law has been problematic, I believe it is still on the books and should be revoked.

Sincerely,

Harry Hergash

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• Africans, Celebration, Emancipation, Harry Hergash, Lincoln Lewis

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