ABSTRACT
On 30 May 1995, Indo-Trinidadians celebrated the sesquicentenary of the arrival of the first Indians on the island of Trinidad. By the end of that year, Basdeo Panday, the grandson of a cane cutter, became the Prime Minister of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, the first ever IndoTrinidadian to assume that high political office. In the run-up decade to these historic markers, Indo-Trinidadians experienced an unprecedented religious and cultural revival, which is often described by its leadership and the intelligentsia alike as a ‘cultural renaissance’. This chapter seeks to locate the politics of this cultural renaissance in the context of the politicoeconomic competition between Indo-and Afro-Trinidadians. The information and insights presented in this chapter were gathered during my sojourn as Visiting Professor of Indian Studies at the University of West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad, during 1994-6. I acknowledge with grateful thanks the assistance and affection received from Dr Brinsley Samaroo. Its substantive focus is on the recent developments within the IndoTrinidadian community, and these are delineated through three case studies. However, a fuller understanding of the current scenario is possible only with the backdrop of the historical evolution of Indo-Trinidadians as a diasporic community.
