NCIC
Issue 1
May 2012
Continued from Page 1
By: Aneela Bhagwat
Indian indentured labourers were initially recruited from the Tribal regions
of Chota Nagpur which was close to
Bengal and Bihar. Called “Dhangars”,
these people were mainly from the Santal, Mundis and Oraon tribes and had
started hiring themselves out within India
as agricultural labourers. Other early
sources for the recruitment of labour
included the city areas around the ports
where many people who had left their
villages in search of employment had
flocked. After the1850s, the demand for
labour increased and more and more
recruits came from other parts of India.
Most recruits to the West Indies came
through the port at Calcutta (Kolkata),
the catchment area for which was the
Indo-Gangetic plains areas close to Bengal: Bihar, the North Western Provinces
(now Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand).
Only a small proportion of indentured
labourers to the West Indies came from
the South of India, through the port at
Madras (Chennai).
The decision to leave was not an easy
one for many of the people who migrated. As was the case in many countries with long years of colonisation,
there was a history in India of people
leaving their homes and villages, leaving their families behind and going off
to different areas in search of jobs, as
seasonal labourers and as members of
the army. They always had the intention
of returning home, however, and the
vast majority of the time they did. Of
those who were sent to Burma, Ceylon
and the tea estates of Assam in the
North East of India, the majority returned home. Many of these emigrants
were unaccompanied men who had left
their families behind, seeking better
prospects abroad for a limited time. For
those who left, the economic circumstances in India at that time were a major “push” factor that forced them to
migrate. The Indo-Gangetic plains from
which the majority of these migrants
came had been affected by the British
East India Company’s “Permanent Settlement Policy”, which re-structured the
Indian land system. This new policy
made land ownership, tenure and cultivation rights very rigid and defined in
order to collect taxes. The result was the
development of a very exploitative relationship between tenant and zameendar (or land owner) which continues to
dominate Indian rural life to this day,
causing underdevelopment of rural areas and agriculture. In the 1800s, the
“Permanent Settlement Policy” resulted
in famines and put many rural families
into deep debt. The East India Company’s trading interest in India also
flooded the
Indian market
with
British
textiles and
other goods
that
competed
with
local Indian
goods.
This
put many Indian craftsmen out of
jobs, causing
the decline of
crafts, which had been handed down
through generations. This in turn created
vast pools of labour which could be easily exploited due to desperation of the
people, especially in the areas of Eastern India. Furthermore, the historical records clearly show that emigration to the
colonies spiked in years when there was
drought and famine in India, whereas it
was more difficult to find recruits when
times were better. It is clear, therefore,
that many who left India did so because
they found themselves in dire circumstances - where the conditions at home
were so untenable that they were willing
to risk the utter darkness of the kaalaa
paani (black waters) in order to simply
survive. There were also those who were
brought to the colonies involuntarily, who
were kidnapped or tricked into coming
by “arkatias.” The arkatias were informal recruiting agents, unofficially part
of the system, hired by the licensed recruiting agents for their familiarity with
the areas from which recruits were
drawn. There were also those who left
to escape the law, or exploitative situations in their village. Some few also left
out of curiosity.
Coming from situations often of desperation - dogged by trickery and
hope, the immigration of 147,000 Indians into the island of Trinidad from
1845 - 1917, transformed this landscape. Through their labour and sacrifice, they carved for their descendents a
brighter future. In no way can one article correct the lack of engagement with
Indo-Caribbean history in our schools,
but it is humble attempt to forge a way
for young people to enter into these
discourses, to think of and around them.
It is a reminder that history does not
only exist in the realm of academic institutions and should not be limited to
them. History exists to engage.
Image courtesy: Mr. Angelo Bissessarsingh and the Virtual
Museum of Trinidad and Tobago
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