Vincentians of Indian descent are now able to trace their genealogy back to India.
During the annual Indian Arrival Day commemoration on Sunday June 4, President of the Indian Heritage Foundation Junior Bacchus, said their website now includes a section for tracing family lineage.
“After 2 years of hard work, we have launched on our SVG Heritage Foundation Website a genealogy section of that site. We are inviting all of us to go to that site and put whatever information you know about your family in the relative section within the site and you will be able to find a lot of your family members who have passed on, and you would be able to trace right back into India where you came from,” Bacchus explained.
He added that this year the foundation will be focusing on building greater peace and harmony among people of Indian descent.
Also addressing the event was Opposition Leader Hon. Dr. Godwin Friday who noted that the resilience and fortitude of those who came through indentureship has allowed the remaining descendants to eventually flourish in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, gave an historical overview of the Indentureship System. The Prime Minister, highlighted aspects of the socio-economic conditions which existed after Emancipation, including the disastrous effects on the labour force which had been significantly reduced following the outbreaks of small pox, yellow fever and cholera within the colonies in the 1800s.
Dr Gonsalves noted that alternative cheap labour from India, Madeira and even liberated Africans is why, there is such cultural diversity among Caribbean People.
In spite of this, the Prime Minister said “we will have dissonances but those dissonances are sorted out either through our cultural engagement, our family and community engagement and also our values, and they have become a core set of values even with the differences of ethnicities.”
Over 2 thousand Indians arrived here on June 1, 1861 through Indentureship.