Indian Guyanese boycotted CARIFESTA 1 after Burnham’s contemptuous dismissal of their leaders’ recommendations

I refer to your feature and Editorial on, “The Inaugural Caribbean Festival of Arts as Prism” recently held virtually. I comment from the perspective of a Guyanese youth (then) who was there. PM Forbes Burnham conceptualized CARIFESTA I as early as 1966. Being President of the WI Student Union in England and member of the League of Coloured People, the 1945 Manchester Pan-African Congress papers had deepened his perspective. As for multi-racial/ethnic British Guiana, he had written his sister in 1945: “I feel strongly about the Indian attitude, but the time has not come to antagonise a large section of the community before I am ready.”

In Guyana, the rural-based and unlettered Indians were beginning to knock on doors jealously guarded by the

Coloured/African urban elite. At Independence in 1966, I was in Secondary School with the ethnic cleansing of 1300 Indian Guyanese in the “Wismar Massacre” and sinking of the Sun Chapman with 43 African Guyanese dead, still raw. The designated “National Hero”, the flag with the Garveyite and Ethiopian African colours made the national motto of “One Nation, One People, One destiny” more of a threat than anything else. Burnham’s disbanding of the ethnicallybalanced SSU formed by the departing British and his firing of Major Raymond Sattaur, its designated head, were disturbing. The blatant rigging of the 1968 elections, where friends from my village’s African section, underaged like me, voted, personally convinced me of the denial of Indian Guyanese’ political rights, following economic rights in rice.

For several reasons, 1969 was memorable for me. Even though from the countryside, I had done my “A” Levels 196970 in Georgetown and after teaching a year at Bush Lot Secondary WCB 197071, taught at Central High School in 197172. I could observe firsthand, the goings on of the urban elite that determined the fate of Guyana. There were two noteworthy political initiatives in 1969: Dr Jagan’s declaration that the PPP was now an “orthodox” political party and the formation of a radical political group RATOON at UG, by primarily African Guyanese intellectuals. This was new: the PNC was being opposed by individuals it assumed it “owned”. In early February 1970, Eric Williams grappled with Black Power protests that by end April precipitated an army revolt by young army officers. I remember following the developments on my “pocket radio”.

Between 16-26 February, Burnham had gathered intellectuals from across the Caribbean to a “Caribbean Writers and Artists Convention” to plan a panCaribbean Conference, which was to be CARIFESTA I. He then moved to preempt similar Black Power reactions here by supporting Stokley Carmichael’s RATOON/ASCRIA-sponsored visit in May for a seminar on Pan Africanists and Black Revolutionary Nationalists. A group of us students walked out at Queen’s when Carmichael insisted that Indian Guyanese should organize separately. RATOON and the newly-formed Movement against Oppression (MAO) that grounded with ghetto youths, disagreed with Carmichael, but not ASCRIA. The shooting of Joshua Ramsammy in October 1971, signaled the PNCs decision to “take on” the radicals violently and further darkened the mood in Georgetown.

The much politicised staff-room of Central High, with Rudy Luck at the head, swirled with conspiracy theories that pointed to a PNC “big one”. The police investigation went nowhere: in Jan 1968 Burnham had constructively fired the first Guyanese COP, Felix Austin and replaced him with the more pliable Carl “Bolo” Austin. It was against this background that Indian Guyanese boycotted CARIFESTA 1 when Burnham contemptuously dismissed the recommendations of Indian leaders and organizations in Guyana – Hindu, Muslim and Christian - and used funds specifically designated for the Indian Repatriation Fund to construct the Cultural Center. This boycott was successful even though in the end, Dr. Jagan caved in. Gora Singh, and his mother Rajkumari Singh and some artistes affiliated with her participated – but to great opprobrium from the community they claimed to represent.

I got to know Gora very well later in NYC and he claimed (in writing) that while most performances were filmed, his was not and Indians overall were peripheralised. My regret then was even though Trinidad’s Sundar Popo had come out with his genre-originating chutney song, “Nana and Nanie” in 1969, it was blanked. Unlike what he had done for “Pan” and “Tamboo Bamboo” Eric Williams and the PNC studiously ignored subaltern Indian cultural creations. From the discussions and planning sessions in Guyana, Taan, Biraha, Quaseedas and Qawalis singing, for instance, were not seen as “cultural”. Gora and troupe were encouraged to perform “fusion” forms. I left for NYC on Sept 16, the day after CARIFESTA I ended. As Martin Carter (who also boycotted CARIFESTA I) said, it was a “dark time”.

Sincerely, Ravi Dev