Indian Protests for Rights: Pre Independence

The unstated policy of the state in Guyana throughout the nineteenth century and up to the middle of the twentieth was, “what’s good for sugar is good for British Guiana”. There was more than a kernel of truth in the popular saying that “B. G.” stood for “Bookers Guiana”, after the largest sugar company “Bookers Bros”. The entire state apparatus was geared towards the protection of “King Sugar”.

The Indians that fought for their rights on the plantations were therefore indirectly going up against the power of the state. From this perspective, the Indians on the sugar plantations carried on the most sustained struggle against the imperial state in the post- emancipation era. In effect, they were the pioneers in the struggle for independence of their country.

Harassment

While most of the violence by colonial armed forces – the police and, on occasion the West Indian Regiment – was deployed to quell labour uprisings on the plantations, there were other daily humiliations inflicted on the immigrants.

John Campbell, chronicler of the history of the police force noted that, “Police were employed to levy rents and to act as bailiffs (and) East Indians quite rightly viewed the police as agents or allies of their oppressors”. Matters were so oppressive that Chief Justice Beaumont labelled police harassment of Indians in the 1870s as “galling subjection”.

The laws were changed in 1883; unfortunately, by that time, the practices and image of the police as bully and enemy in the minds of Indians had been set and the damage had been done.

Protests

Since any act on the plantations in protest over their working conditions could be defined as an “overt rebellion” and result in an increased length of indentureship, immigrants did not lightly enter into such actions. Yet the immigrants did protest; one could only imagine the provocations.

We will scrutinize the consequences for the immigrants.

Up to 1869, the official record is fairly bereft of Indian immigrant protests. The “stop- start” nature of the immigration program would have been one reason. There were no shipments after the experiment of 1838 until 1845, followed by another gap to 1848. On resumption, recruitment had shifted to the Bhojpuri area of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh and most of the shipments were from Calcutta.

By 1869, arising out of their cultural uniformity, there would have been the beginning of a critical mass of immigrants on the plantations with some sentiment of community and solidarity.

Conditions on the plantations, by then, would have been volatile as can be gleaned by the bare statistics on population. Of the 69,380 Indian immigrants that had arrived by 1869, 6,523 had returned to India but only 44,936 showed up in the census. It meant that if no one had been born, 17,921 or 26 per cent had died. And many had been born into the institutions of pain and discipline. Something had to give.

1869: Leonora, West Coast Demerara

In July of 1869, forty workers of the shovel gang at Plantation Leonora disputed the wages for work done, and it was alleged that they assaulted a manager. The response was swift after their protest was supported by fellow workers: “Although the colony was the HQ of the 2nd West India Regiment, the police were charged with the first line of de fence.

In 1869, troops were sent to Pln. Leonora after police had been defeated, even though governor said it was a police matter. After the Leonora Riot, the police force was regarded as the most heavily armed police in the British West Indies.”

Even though no one was killed, the protesting workers were arrested, convicted and jailed. The system had begun to perform a “one-two” – first the police would use violence to maintain “order” and then the judiciary would emphasise the condign lesson to the immigrant by applying the “law”. This was to be the pattern for the next hundred years.

The Leonora protest had wide reverberations. A former stipendiary magistrate, William Des Voux, upon hearing of the incident, wrote a forty-page exposé, and sent it to the Secretary of State, Lord Granville, who gave it wide exposure in London. A Royal Commission of Inquiry was sent out in 1870, and in addition to several recommendations, it observed: “The Coolie despises the Negro, because he considers him not so highly civilised; while the Negro in turn, despises the Coolie, because he is so immensely inferior to him in physical strength. There will never be much danger of seditious disturbances among East Indian immigrants on estates so long as large numbers of Negroes continue to be employed with them.”

1870: Countrywide

Strikes and violence swept Plantations Uitvlugt, Hague, Zeelugt, Vergenoegen (West Coast, near Leonora) and Success, Mon Repos and Non Pariel, on the East Coast of Demerara.

At issue were disputes over pay for “tasks”.

1872: Devonshire Castle, Essequibo Coast

Five immigrants killed, seven wounded. The Devonshire Castle protests would be a watershed event, as it represented the first time that Indian immigrants would be shot and killed by the police. It was obvious that the Royal Commission’s recommendations of 1870 were merely a palliative, and there were no lasting reforms of the system. From this point onwards, “strikes” would be deemed as “riots” at which the Riot Act could be read and the strikers shot dead.

The casus belli at Devonshire Castle was the mistrust of the Indians for the judicial system. On Sept 29, Parag had been arrested for assaulting a manager at Devonshire Castle, but was rescued from confinement; he cross-charged the manager. The next day, Parag refused to appear at the Magistrate’s Court where the manager would have been allowed to sit beside the magistrate. Instead, he, along with 250 other immigrants, appeared at the estate and prevented the manager or anyone else from entering.

Twenty-three armed police officers and the magistrate appeared, and the latter ordered the policemen to load their rifles. The police were then ordered to charge – the immigrants stood their ground and one police officer discharged a shot. The other policemen thought the order to shoot had been given, and nine other policemen fired. It is noteworthy that of those who did not fire, were the two Indian police men.

At the Inquest, the policemen’s actions were exonerated as “justifiable homicide”. The Colonist, a paper friendly to planter interests, exulted, “the leaden argument has brought submission quicker than all honeyed words that could have been used.” The “leaden argument” from the police guns was to speak with terrifying regularity against Indians from then on, and helped to make “police” a word for Indians to scare their children.

That the police were invariably Africans did not assist in amicable race-relations between Africans and Indians.

1873: Skeldon, Corentyne, Berbice

The underlying cause was, once again, the widespread mistrust of the judicial system by Indians, and the collusion of the drivers in their oppression.

In this instance, a magistrate fined an immigrant for allegedly inciting others to be absent from work. Aware of the unfairness of the charge, two hundred other immigrants demanded the release of the accused, and the magistrate, in fear, complied. Then the workers demanded that the driver who made the accusation, be handed over.

Other immigrants brought the situation under control yet, the originally charged immigrant and two others were sentenced to five years of penal servitude.

1873: Uitvlugt, West Coast Demerara

The casus belli was low wages for fieldwork. The workers complained to the magistrate, who asked that they return to work and he would examine their complaint.

The workers complied but the manager hired Barbadians at lower rates. The immigrants chased them off and complained again to magistrate, who again promised to investigate. The workers then gathered before the manager’s house, pursuing one ‘Brown’.

They wrecked the house and beat off a party of regular and rural constables. Fifty armed police officers, with the magistrate, appeared, and the Inspector-General himself ordered them to load their rifles. The Indians dispersed and were pursued by bayoneted officers.

Twenty-five men were arrested and charged. The judicial system fulfilled its role by fining the workers.

1879: Skeldon, Corentyne, Berbice

Serious fighting broke out between Indians and Africans during the Muslim Tadjah festival of Muhhoram, and members of both groups were arrested.

The Indians attempted to rescue their comrades, and all police from the Corentyne were mustered after the prisoners were transferred out. Inspector-General Cox, who had also been at Uitvlugt, travelled to Skeldon by train, while armed policemen proceeded by schooner. The crowd had dispersed but fourteen more were arrested, all tried, and sentenced.

1896: Non-Pariel, East Coast Demerara

Oct 1896, five were killed and 59 wounded. The dispute arose over rates for a task, after which the manager demanded that five workers be expelled from the plantation for “incitement”. He later obtained warrants and called in the police to execute.

This expulsion of workers who objected to working conditions, was to become a frequently used weapon in the planters’ arsenal.

The African policemen were called in to execute these warrants. The police fired into the crowds that had gathered in solidarity with the accused, without reading the Riot Act.

1903: Friends, East Bank Berbice

May 1903: six killed and seven wounded. The dispute arose over payment for task work. The workers wanted to lay their grievance before the immigration agent but the manager had the workers arrested. The police were called in and they arrested six immigrants. The Riot Act was read and when the crowd resisted, the police fired.

1905: Georgetown: Riots and Partiality

Six killed, 14 wounded. On November 29, 1905, workers in Georgetown went on strike and rioted, assaulted innocent citizens and looted and stoned houses including those of officials. The police finally opened fire, killing four and wounding 10.

Crowds attacked the Parliament Buildings – the militia was called out, but only 200 out of 300 responded since many were sympathetic to the rioters. Government officials had to be sworn in as special constables and, assisted by troops from two battleships, quelled the riots three days later.

At Plantation Ruimveldt in the meantime, crowds attacking the manager’s house were fired upon, and two were killed with four wounded. Two points can be discerned.

Firstly, while lives were lost during the 1905 riots, the authorities were willing to absorb a tremendous damage to property before maximum force was ordered, quite unlike the norm on the plantations.

Secondly, the reluctance of the African-dominated police and militia to fire on fellow Africans became quite open.

1912: Lusignan, East Coast Demerara

Sept. 18, 1912: One killed. Shovelmen struck over a task dispute. The workers alleged that the manager fired a shot at the crowd of immigrants, wounding one worker, who died later that day. The manager was charged with murder but was acquitted.

Witnesses reported that, “Negro factory hands were also armed and placed at the windows to keep watch.”

1913: Rose Hall, Canje, Berbice

April 1913: 14 killed. The dispute centred over a promised holiday granted to workers then rescinded by a manager. Seven individuals protested and the manager attempted to expel them from the plantation.

Later, warrants were issued for some other immigrants.

The police, including the inspector-general from Georgetown himself, attempted to execute the warrants and the crowds resisted. The Riot Act was read and the police fired, and fourteen immigrants were killed. One policeman was also killed. It was the largest number of immigrants ever killed in one protest.

The killings at Rose Hall created a stir in India and helped to convince the government of India to abolish the Indentureship Scheme in 1917.

1924: Ruimveldt, East Bank Demerara

April 3: Thirteen killed, eighteen wounded. On April 1, 1824, a strike broke out in some Water Street firms in Georgetown. The strikers’ march turned violent against persons and property – sawmills, wharves, the power and railway stations, sewerage and water works, hotels, private homes of the wealthy etc.

The militia were called out since the police did not contain the violence. The press blamed the African policemen for being partial to their kin: “the government will be well advised to set about stiffening the ranks with a number of European non-commissioned officers…” On April 2, mobs attacked the manager’s house at Pln. Providence, but the police put down the disturbance with no violence.

On April 3, a large crowd of some five thousand persons (0-15 per cent Africans and the remainder Indians) marched towards the Georgetown from the East Bank plantations.

They were stopped at Ruimveldt by the police, under the command of the inspector- general and members of the militia.

The Riot Act was read by a magistrate and the order was given to fire. Thirteen persons were killed – 12 Indians and one African – and 18 wounded.

The Indians were so traumatised by the incidents at Ruimveldt that there were no strikes recorded for the next three years. They also lost all faith in Critchlow’s BGLU. The killings torpedoed a Colonisation Scheme, which envisaged re-opening Indian immigration.

1930s: Sugar Plantations

The Great Depression percolated down from the metropolitan countries into the colonies, and Guyana was wracked by strikes on the plantations as the workers’ wages and working conditions were squeezed mercilessly throughout the thirties.

“Unrest in British Guiana was so widespread that in 1933 Governor Denham instructed the press to suppress publication of news of labour disturbances in estates.”

1935: East Demerara

A State of Emergency was proclaimed on the East Coast and East Bank of Demerara, but the situation was so combustible that the police felt it necessary to deploy so many of their personnel that they had to employ civilians in October for routine tasks.

1937: Sugar Plantations

Strikes broke out on the East Bank of Demerara and Blairmont, W. C. Berbice, where strikers were taken before the courts for allegedly assaulting a driver and overseer.

1938: Sugar Plantations

Strikes continued on the East Bank, and police reinforcements from Georgetown were thought necessary to quell demonstrations. One hundred and forty-seven persons were convicted on various charges.

1939: Leonora, West Coast Demerara

Four dead, 4 injured. The protests on the plantations continued unabated, and in February 1938, the police cracked down on behalf of the planters, even as the West Indian Commission (Moyne Commission) was conducting hearings on the phenomenon of violence that had engulfed the West Indies over the crisis in the sugar industry.

In fact, the strikers at Leonora had attempted to cross the Demerara River to meet the Commission, but were prevented from doing so. After the strikers (including several Africans) resisted the local police’s efforts to disband them, reinforcement from Georgetown arrived and eventually the order to fire was given. Three Indians and one African died. As usual, a Commission of Inquiry exonerated the Police from any blame.

“The report, however, was rather contradictory in that while justifying the shooting, it found that demonstrators ‘did not resort to the direct use of lethal weapons or gather with the preconceived intention of destroying life or property.’”

The Man-Power Citizens Association (MPCA), led by Mr Ayube Eden was recognised as the bargaining agent for the sugar workers the next year, but very quickly, their ardour for representing workers’ interests waned as the Sugar Producer’s Association (SPA) bought out some executives. The factory workers, it should be noted, chose to be represented by Critchlow’s BGLU. Ethnic concerns were coming to the fore more explicitly.

1948: Enmore, East Coast Demerara

Five killed, nine injured. In April 1948, there was a split in the MPCA, and a new union – the Guiana Industrial Workers’ Union (GIWI) – called a strike on the East Coast Demerara plantations over a change in the work rules for cane cutters. On June 15, three overseers were stripped and embarrassed by strikers. The next day, police reinforcements were sent to the plantations; the strikers felt threatened and confrontations ensued. The police fired, and five were killed and nine injured.

After the 1948 strikes and killings, the State felt that a new approach was needed to keep the Indians on the plantations in line. A “Special Branch” which was patterned after Scotland Yard, was established. The officers in “plain clothes” could easier keep surveillance over the Indians, who were still defined as the greatest threat to the state.

The killings of the “Enmore Martyrs” led to the formation of the People’s Progressive Party in 1950.

1957: Skeldon, Corentyne Berbice

Strikers at Skeldon, in February 1957, alleged that the manager refused to hold a meeting with their committee as stipulated in the labour agreement. The workers struck; the Skeldon Police Station felt they could not handle the situation, and police from New Amsterdam were sent in. Tear gas was thrown and fired into the crowd, which scattered. A little later, however, a police officer fired on a group with a “Greener Gun” that wounded 13 workers with pellets. The policeman was found to have made an “error of judgement”. The police and judiciary were still doing their “one-two”.