A force in the BC movement
N 1961 when the former apartheid regime had pulled out of the Commonwealth and declared the country a republic, all the separate Indian, white, coloured and African schools were forced to raise the new apartheid flag and show their allegiance to the white-run South Africa.
At that time, Sumboornam Pillay, who later became known as Sam Moodley after marrying another Black Consciousness activist, Strinivasan Moodley, was a 13-year-old pupil at the Dundee High School in the then Northern Natal.
Her school was preparing to celebrate the Republic Day. But young Sumboornam found that her cultural teachings did not allow her to celebrate something that was discriminatory in nature and against the human rights of the people.
“It was the first time that we as children at school were asked to raise the flag but a number of people talked to us and called on us to stay away from the Republic Day celebrations.
“We stayed at home as we all refused to have anything to do with the flag-raising ceremony,” she told me in an interview.
In her early years her father, VP Pillay, had a major influence on her upbringing because of his work in school building projects, housing and welfare work in Dundee.
His religious teachings in Shaivism also gave direction to her social and spiritual leanings of “treating all people with the humanity they deserve”.
The close-knit families in Dundee enjoyed cross-cultural engagements and black families (Indian, coloured, and African) lived side by side, sharing and protecting each other until the impact of the Group Areas Act that slowly crept in to separate the three groups.
Her activist mind gained momentum when, during her matric year in 1965, she vocally articulated her disapproval of the lack of provision of teachers at the Dundee High School.
“There were no ‘political protests’ in those days. I led a delegation to the principal objecting to substitute teachers, who were sent to replace our maths and history teachers who had resigned.
“They were unqualified in these subjects and were sent as punitive measures to rural areas. They refused to teach material they knew nothing about. It was their form of protest. So we had to teach ourselves,” she said.
Her father, the only breadwinner of a family of six, had to get a loan to send her to university on Salisbury Island, the only university for Indianorigin students in Durban.
Here she met people like Strini Moodley, Dennis Pather, Kriba Pillay, Asha Rambally, Kogs Reddy, Ben David, Roy Tathiah, Nash Naina, and Archie Augustine.
All of them became involved in a black theatre protest group.
“We produced the first
Black on White. satirical review looking at the political conditions in South Africa. The review was called Black on White that ran for three years from 1966 to 1968.”
It was the beginning of her life as a cultural activist, using theatre to conscientise communities about the socio-economic and political situation in South Africa.
She continued with her black consciousness activism when she obtained a teaching job at the Witteklip High School in Chatsworth in 1970. The authorities and the notorious Security Branch at that time did not take this lightly.
She found herself unemployed at the end of 1972 when the, then, Indian Education Department refused to renew her contract.
She had lost her teaching job and had no support from her fellow teachers.
She said, “Generally teachers were silenced out of fear of the draconian measures taken by the state then. Nobody, not even the Teachers Association of South Africa (Tasa), made representations, even when they were called to do so.
“However, the 1972 students at Witteklip Secondary were infused with the determination to change the conditions in their communities, especially among the youth.
“They formed the Chatsworth Education Through Theatre (Chett) group and in 1973, when I was banned, a few of them were arrested by the Special Branch and were forced to give evidence in a case against me, which was eventually dropped.”
For Sumboornam the years 1970 to 1973 were the most politically-active years.
Within the South African Student Organisation (Saso) and Black Community Programmes (BCP), together with the protagonists of the Black Consciousness Movement like Ramphele Mamphele, Debs Mashoba, Vuyi Mashalaba, Steve Biko, Barney Pityana and Strini Moodley, they engaged themselves in community development projects like building of schools, establishing health clinics, literacy programmes, women’s programmes and engaged in self-help projects.
“This was also a time of using theatre as a form of revolt, as part of our Cultural Revolution. We held Theatre Festivals bringing theatre groups from Johannesburg, Cape Town and Port Elizabeth, and made Durban a buzz place of cultural activities.
“Durban was exposed to avant-garde theatre for the first time. During this time we were still under the vigilant eyes of the Special Branch who followed our every move.”