Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 7

Author(s): Nand Kishor Prasad
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

Page 125

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Vaishali İnstitute Research Bulletin No.
atleast getting protection from the plantation system. Indeed, they were segregated from the non-Indians in the plantations and later in the Indian settlements.
While the Hindus preserved their identity they also got a moral support from the Muslims who constituted about 13 per cent of the total Indian population in 1891.9 The two communities lived in harmony and faced the onslaughts from the non-Indians boldly. Some Hindus participated in the Tazia (Husain or Hosay) procession at the end of Muharram from the 1850s which became the "annual demonstration of Indian feeling”. In October 1884 one Balgopaul Singh was prosecuted by the Trinidad police for taking a leading part in the Hosay riots. 10
Religion had a powerful role in helping indentured Indians to rebuild their way of life and the Hindus retained their respect for Brahman and Kshatriya castes, 11 Moreover, the Hindus were fortunate in the leadership provided by the Brahmans who "resumed their priestly functions and enjoyed much the same reverence as in India" 12. Even in the early days of the indenture the priest would loudly read the epic the Ramayan, specially the Ramacharitamanas of Tulsidas in the evening for the benefit of the Hindus of his area and the lower caste Hindus would take care of his task in the field. Later the priests like Bhagoutie (Bhagawati) born in the Basti zila (district) of U. P. in North India who knew Sanskrit, Hindi and English, Ramjattan Pandit from the Bihar province of India, 18 Pandit Capildeo of Chaguanas who had come from the Gorakhpur district and Pandit Janaki Prasad Sharma born in 1893 in U. P. (India) who later became the dharmacharya of the Sanatanists in Trinidad and a great expounder of Shrimadbhagwatgeeta, helped the growth of Hinduism.
Moreover, several prominent Hindus born in Trinidad worked for the consolidation of the Hindu society. For example, Simbhoonath
8.
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F. E. M. Hosein's paper on “East Indians in Trinidad”, Port of Spain Gazette (Henceforth Pos Gazette), 5 May 1913. J. C. Jha, “The Indian Heritage in Trinidad" in J. G. La Guerre (ed.), Calcutta to Caroni, Longman Caribbean, Port of Spain, 1974, p. 5. Pos Gazette, 22 Nov. 1884. P. M. Sherlock, West Indies, 1966, p. 124. B. Brerton, A History of Modern Trinidad, 1783-1962, Port of Spain, 1981, p. 105. M. J. Kirpalani et al (ed.), Indian Centenary Review : 100 Years of Progress : Trinidad, 1845-1945, Pos, 1945, p. 159.
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