161st anniversary of Indian immigration Bisnauth sees development of authentic Guyanese culture as key challenge Stabroek News May 7, 1999 A forward looking perspective was described as a major reason for the success of Indian immigrants here and Education Minister Dale Bisnauth has cited the development of an authentic Guyanese culture as one of the challenges facing their descendants. Delivering the main address on Wednesday at a ceremony to mark the 161st anniversary of the arrival of the first batch of Indian immigrants in Guyana, Dr Bisnauth said that he is confident that in the same way "our foreparents reached into the depths of their spirituality and found the motivation with which to respond to the challenges of their time, we can do the same thing with flexibility, resilience and tolerance." He said that in spite of the conditions of indentureship, they fashioned an identifiable distinctive lifestyle from scraps of remembered customs. The early morning ceremony held in the Monument Gardens, Camp and Church Streets, was organised by the Indian Commemoration Trust Foundation of Guyana. Present were Chairman of the foundation, Yesu Persaud, who delivered a welcome address, other executives; Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports, Gail Teixeira; Agriculture Minister, Reepu Daman Persaud; City Mayor, Hamilton Green and other invitees. Noting that the first ever voyage between India and Guyana was this year being commemorated in a climate shrouded by tension, internationally and locally, he said that the traits of `in spite of', virtues of deferred gratification and the capacity to look forward and not backward are not only for people of Indian descent but for all Guyanese who share one geographical space and are committed to building one nation with a common future. Guyanese, he said, are aware of the ethnically motivated atrocities surrounding the events in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo, the political uncertainties in India itself and of industrial tension here where most things, unfortunately, are seen through the prism of racism and ethnic biases. Giving a brief background to the arrival of the first batch of Indian immigrants, Dr Bisnauth said that some 396 Indian indentured labourers of an original batch of 414 had boarded the Hesperus and Whitby from Calcutta to Guyana. This started a movement of a transfer of labour from the British Raj to another country under British supervision. Offspring of Indian indentured labourers would grow into the largest ethnic segment of a culturally plural society and the larger element of a politically dual society. Speaking of the challenges now facing descendants of Indian immigrants to Guyana, Dr Bisnauth said that pursuing cultural development that is "authentically Guyanese without mimicry of that which is occidental (characteristic of the west) or oriental...... is another major challenge". "How to be committed to national development without threat to national development (and) segmental integrity" was also another challenge cited by Bisnauth. He noted, however, that virtues and traits which Indian immigrants and their descendants have practised while keeping together as a people are inherent in all peoples in varying degrees. He said that in spite of the humblest of beginnings, they laid the foundation on which succeeding generations were to build enduring lives for themselves. It was from this basis that "they were to contribute handsomely of men and women and material work to the building of the Guyanese nation". He added that in spite of everything, "the barefooted almost bareback people of lowly peasant stock were to carve a living throbbing monument of living posterity without which this country cannot survive". Nevertheless, he said that in spite of what has been the characteristic element of Indian ancestors, the spirit that motivated them was to be forward looking. Because they were forward looking, this "probably, more than anything else, made them different from many others in similar circumstances. They were forward looking in the sense that they were not in the habit of dwelling on the atrocities of indentureship." The immigrants themselves exercised a disciplined resolution to bury the past in the past and to leave it there without resurrecting it and using it as justification for failure in the present, not harping on the past ad nauseam, as excuses for not performing well in the present, he said. He added that "they did not allow the memory, psychic or historical of perished yesterday to traumatise (them) that they cannot respond creatively to the challenges of today and tomorrow. That fundamental immigrant/Indian/and probably Hindu spirituality has expressed itself in the sacrifice each Indian generation has made in the interest and for the welfare of the next generation, he posited. The focus, he said, has always been the future of their children and their children's children. Indian foreparents, he said, practised "the virtue of deferred gratification, that voluntary postponement of the satisfaction and desires and wishes of today in the interest of tomorrow's children." This more than anything else, he posited, explains the phenomenon of the success of people of Indian origin, that is, one generation building from the base laid by the previous generation. Dr Bisnauth noted that largely even those virtues were stereotyped by the larger community as parsimoniousness or in colloquial language as `stinginess'. At the root of the successes, he said, is the capacity for not dwelling on the evils of the past. (Miranda La Rose)