PM Rowley celebrates strength of Indian community in Trinidad and Tobago

Trinidad and Tobago: Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley addressed the nation on the Indian Arrival Day on Thursday and called for the citizens to understand the huge struggles of the forefathers of the land.

He noted that everyone must celebrate the strength shown by subsequent generations of the Indian community in Trinidad and Tobago over the last 179 years.

During his address, the Prime Minister said that by examining the history of those ancestors, one must marvel at the bold and daring risk that they took.

As he recalled the struggles of those who are forced to leave their homes thousands of miles away, most from villages in India’s Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, others from southern regions and Calcutta, PM Rowley said that everyone needs to look back into the country’s history so that “We could approach our collective future with huge clarity and confidence.”

He continued to say that everyone must be mindful that after the Abolition of African slavery in 1838, the British colonial officials set about replacing the slaves who left the plantations with around 150,000 Indian indentured immigrants over the period from 1845 to 1917 on contract.

According to PM Keith Rowley, it was good for the indentured that there were no successful attempts by the colonials of cultural erasure, and in this new land, they were permitted to retain their religion as well as their culture, which gave them a sense of being.

He added that Dr Eric Williams who is known as the father of the nation said in 1970 that there could be ‘No Mother Africa, No Mother India, No Mother China or Mother Suria but only Mother Trinidad and Tobago.’

Rowley continued to say that the United Nations Economic Social and Cultural Organisation in a position paper on multiculturalism said that the successful management of it and multiethnic societies as of Trinidad and Tobago needs not only a democratic polity but the struggle against exclusion and social inequalities.

He claimed proudly that UNESCO was speaking about the history of Trinidad and Tobago as a nation and people here have maintained democratic polity and continues to fight against exclusion and social inequalities.