The difficulty to pronounce the word “agreement” led to its mispronunciation by the Indian villagers of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh states, who were travelling on ships to various European colonies, as “Girmit”[1]. Later on, the people who went as indentured contractual labourers to these colonies were called”Girmitiya”. Over 1.5 million of Indian Indentured labourers were uprooted from their beloved homeland and sent to different countries like Mauritius, Surinam, Guyana, Holland, Trinidad, Fiji and other islands nations,in the hope of better future. Girmitiya and Kantraki (Contract) as they came to be known, once left, could never return to India, and what did remain with them were the memories of their Country, their people, village and culture.
The Indian Indentured labourers’ system started following the abolition of slavery by Britain in 1833[2]. During that period, Europe, which then was controlling the whole world, needed a cheap workforce because the abolition of slavery caused the liberation of Africans in the United Kingdom creating an economic disaster for British sugarcane plantations owners in the Caribbean region, and elsewhere. The situation compelled sugarcane owners to look for a regular, docile and low-waged labour force to work in hot and humid farms[3]. Consequently, a new legal system of forced labour was designed by the British, which although allowed the labourers to be called by another term — indentured labourers— was no different from enslavement[4]. Soon, under this indentured labour scheme, the enslaved Africans began to be replaced mainly by Indians on sugarcane plantations, across the British Empire and other European countries.
In 1834, the Indentured system started dispatching the labourers to work in Mauritius, Uganda and Nigeria for an initial five year period. Later, in 1838 the first two shiploads carrying Indian labourers to Caribbean region was sent from Calcutta[5], which arrived in British Guiana (now Guyana) on May 5, 1838, onboard the Whitby and Hesperus. From 1838 to 1917, over half a million Indians were sent as indentured labourers from former Colonial India to thirteen mainland and island nations in the Caribbeanto address the demand for sugarcane plantation labour[6].
In the early decades of the sugarcane-driven migrations, the indentured Indians were treated inhumanely as the enslaved Africans had been. They were confined to their estates and paid a pitiful salary. Any breach of contract brought automatic criminal penalties and imprisonment. Many of them were carried away from their homelands deceptively. Many from inland regions over a thousand kilometres from seaports were promised jobs, were not told the work they were being hired for, or that they would leave their homeland and communities. They were hustled aboard the waiting ships, unprepared for the long and arduous four-month sea journey. Charles Anderson, a special magistrate investigating these sugarcane plantations, wrote to the British Colonial Secretary declaring that with few exceptions, the indentured labourers are treated with great and unjust severity. Plantation owners enforced work in sugarcane farms so harshly that the decaying remains of immigrants were frequently discovered in sugarcane fields. If labourers protested and refused to work, they were not paid or fed: they simply starved[7].
Only a few thousand of Indentured labourers were given the choice of returning to India at their own expense after their agreement was complete. Most of them were refused to be sent back. The majority opted to stay because they could not afford to return under the low pay or even in many instances, they were denied paid wages. They couldn’t save money for their return, and with guilt, they opted to stay there. It wasn’t very respectful for them to come back to their homeland empty-handed after spending years in other Country. They were made fool. After the expiry of their girmits (Agreement), many leased small plots of land and developed their sugarcane fields or cattle farmlets. Others went into business in the towns that were beginning to spring up. It was challenging for them and their coming generations. Their first 3-4 generations struggled to establish themselves there.
Finally, in the year 1917, the Indian indenture system was banned[8]. According to The Economist, the Imperial Legislative Council finally ended indenture not on the humanitarian ground but rather because of pressure from Indian nationalists and declining profitability[9]. The sugarcane plantation-driven migrations led to an ethnically significant presence of Indians in the Caribbean. In some islands and countries, these Indo-Caribbean migrants now constitute a considerable proportion of the population. Sugarcane plantations and citizens of Indian origin continue to thrive in countries such as Guyana (formerly British Guiana), Jamaica Trinidad and Tobago, Martinique, French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Kitts, St. Croix, Suriname, and Nevis. By some estimates, over 2.5 million people in the Caribbean are of Indian origin[10]. Many have ethnically blended with migrants from other parts of the world, creating a unique syncretic culture. The table below shows the total number of Indian Indentured labourers on records.
| Name of the Colony | Numbers of Labourers Transported |
| British Mauritius | 453, 063 |
| British Guiana | 238, 909 |
| British Trinidad and Tobago | 143, 939 |
| British Jamaica | 36, 412 |
| British Malaya | 400,000 |
| British Grenada | 3,200 |
| British Saint Lucia | 4,350 |
| Natal | 152,184 |
| Saint Kitts | 337 |
| Saint Vincent | 2,472 |
| Reunion | 26,507 |
| Dutch Surinam | 34,304 |
| British Fiji | 60,965 |
| East Africa | 32,000 |
| Seychelles | 6,315 |
| British Singapore | 3,000 |
| Total | 1,597,957 |
While working on this article, the author talked to a few of Girmityas from Fiji, Mauritius, Guyana, Surinam and Trinidad, and can proudly say that they are absolutely like us – the Indian. One of the Girmitya (Diaspora) to whom the author talked currently lives in the Netherlands and shared his feeling and experience. The individual said that he lives in the Netherlands because he was born in Surinam, a Dutch colony. He further shared that although he has 3 flags to look up to, unfortunately, does not feel connected to any; instead, he gets confused. He said that Surinam’s 35% of the population is Indian (approx.), but African ethnic people control the Country. Now he lives in the Netherlands and does not feel connected to it since it is governed by the Dutch and sadly he cannot call himself even an Indian because his ancestors were taken to Surinam approximately 120 years back. However, the exciting thing was that he happily and confidently call himself a Bhojpuria and still feels connected with India and the people in Netherlands and Surinam because the culture, music and tradition are still same. According to him, it is Bhojpuri language, culture and practices that have kept them united and connected. Indeed, there is a pain of being a Girmitiya or Kantraki but being a Bhojpuria connects them, giving them hope and strength.
Today it is their 5th or 6th generation staying in there, and they are flourishing, but still, India and the Indian National Flag- the tricolour- is their moment of pride. Still, they feel so strongly connected with India that they can’t differentiate between the Country they are living and India. Mauritius and Surinam is such a country that the Indian diaspora people have kept their culture, language, songs, music, traditions and almost everything intact similar to India. Most of the people from India taken as indentured labourers were from Bihar and Eastern Up. Their language was Bhojpuri. With some changes and mix with other tongues, they still speak Bhojpuri. They have got the feeling about India and its culture. They want to know about India and their ancestors’ place. Many of them have visited India in search of their ancestral roots, a few of them have found their distance family, but sadly many of them have not. If the Indian Government can assist them with their roots, it will open a new vista of relationship between two set of community separated generations back. Today after the struggle of more than 100 years or so, although they are settled, they still crave for their roots and identity.
Experiences Shared By :
Author – Devendra Singh
Writer, Lyricist, Filmmaker.
Co-ordinator – Bihari Diaspora, GTRi
Picture 1 – Immigration Pass, 1852
Sanjay Kumar (Fiji)Picture 2
JahaJi Bhai FB page
References :
The Economist 2017, The legacy of Indian migration to European colonies, The Economist, Accessed on 26 November 2020, https://www.economist.com/international/2017/09/02/the-legacy-of-indian-migration-to-european-colonies
Experiences Shared By :
Author – Devendra Singh
Writer, Lyricist, Filmmaker.
Co-ordinator – Bihari Diaspora, GTRi
Picture 1 – Immigration Pass, 1852
Sanjay Kumar (Fiji)Picture 2
JahaJi Bhai FB page
