A book written by Hemraj Ramdatt
Review by Deepti Agarwal
Mr. Hemraj ji, before reviewing the book Beyond Indentureship Indo-Trinadidian Entrepreneurs, I would like to tell you a story. On 17 December 1904 , on the ship ‘ S S Avon’ going from Calcutta to Trinidad, a child is born, whom his parents Chulhan Singh and Yashoda call ‘ Avon ‘ after the ship. After a journey of 69 days, the parents land with the young child in the unknown land of Trinidad along with other Indian indentured laborers to work in the sugarcane fields and reach the Picton sugarcane estate. There the child is considered as God’s offering and is again named Ramprasad. In India, he left Sioti village in the old city of Gaya and went to Trinidad. The reason was that Chulhan was a Bhumihar and Yashoda was from the Kayastha caste. Hence, their family did not accept their love marriage and they threw them out of the house. He started living a humiliating life in a hut outside the village and one day, fed up with the humiliation, he became an indentured servant, signed the papers and after traveling through 89 days of black water from Calcutta via Patna, reached Trinidad and the grandson of this Ramprasad, is Hemraj Ramdutt, the author of the book. After a gap of 115 years, on 17 January 2019, Ramdatt returns to Seoti village to find his roots and imagine how emotional Hemraj must have become after visiting that house and his relatives. Trinidad is his birthplace and India is his grandmother’s home . The world is so small , today business consultant , researcher , Hemraj, who worked in the FMCG sector and immigrated to Canada from Trinidad, came to Seoti village in India to trace his roots and was fortunate to have the opportunity to meet his relatives back home. There are so many workers who have spent lakhs of rupees but have not been able to find their roots. The same Hemraj ji told us through his book that how his ancestors had not only taken mangoes , blackberries and the packets of Tulsi Ramcharitmanas in the ‘jahaji bundle’, they had also taken with them religion , values , hardwork , livelihood and unwavering faith in God. The result of which was that along with the seeds of the plants, their values and values also flourished and today the Indians there not only created their own distinct ethnic identity ‘ Indo Trinidadian ‘ but also greatly improved the economy of their country. All this is not just bookish things, in my recent trip to Trinidad , Guyana , Suriname, I have seen and felt all this with my own eyes. During my trip to Trinidad, in Port of Spain , Pinal , Faizabad , Siparia , Marbella etc., I found that the fourth and fifth generations of workers who lived in slavery-like conditions that time have today made their mark in all sectors of the economic system, whereas their ancestors left India completely empty handed. They had come from India to Trinidad and were victims of all kinds of colonial exploitation. But by cutting their stomachs, how they managed to save money, they imparted values and education to their children, became owners of lands and by the time the indentured system ended in 1920, 19,384 Indians had become entrepreneurs, including 12,304 sugarcane , 843 there were 1394 proprietors and 1075 shopkeepers in the cultivation of cocoa and 3316 in the cultivation of other commodities . This book documents everything I saw and experienced in Trinidad. By writing this book, Hemraj ji has given a true tribute to all his indentured ancestors.
Thank you.
Deepti Agarwal