The journey of the women of Indian Diaspora as carriers of culture and preservers of identity was not easy because of their circumstances and the patriarchal nature of Indian society. The voice of the silent majority, i.e. woman, has been rarely heard in historical documents that record the statements of the literate and thoughts of the influential. The part played by Indian women in the great 19th century Diaspora which has irretrievably transformed so many former colonies of the British and French Empires, has been extremely undervalued. Indian indentured women have tended to be portrayed as dependants and spouses, reluctant to migrate, and of negligible labour value, or as lone females of dubious virtue. Such characterisations were the work of contemporaries - the European officials who authored so many of the documents we use today - but they were echoed by many historians later.
Preservation of links with Mother India
The paucity of women, apart from being a serious social issue, necessitated marriages across social barriers and sometimes across religious boundaries. However, they never lost their links with their past, their culture, language or religion. They ensured the preservation of these links with India, along with the celebration of traditional festivals like Holi for the Hindus or Muharram for the Muslims. It was often the woman in the family who played an important role in ensuring that Bhojpuri was spoken within the family. We must acknowledge that these indentured women who remained wedded to their oral traditions and language, played an essential role as a carrier of this culture.
Through the letters, petitions and statements of the Indian indentured women, a cogent analysis can be made of their role in developing identity and maintaining cultural linkages with their past. Scholars have noted that despite the efforts by the colonisers to impose a new form of slavery on the
Indian indentured, the role that these women assumed was significantly different from that expected of their slave predecessors. This was possibly due to the fact that women were unequally integrated into capitalist production and into the plantation economy in particular. This was in contrast to the central participation of female slaves in plantation agriculture in the pre-abolishing period.
As a result, the position that women enjoyed in the indentured society has not been recorded in a sympathetic manner. They have either been referred to as a 'sorry sisterhood' of Indian women tricked into going abroad or from marginalised social classes or castes or as 'abandoned women', picking and choosing husbands for themselves. There is no consensus in the available literature as to their actual position in the society at that time. No version is accurate and has been rejected by later historians, particularly feminist historians. The latter have also sought to exculpate women from charges of immorality as replicated in the traditional historiography of the period. The women at that time did seek to be treated as individuals, not as a commodity. They did strive to recreate stable partnership and happy family life in their new homes. Nevertheless, the skewered ratio between men and women indentured in the early years had an impact on the development of stable family life. It was only later that the colonial Government decided to sponsor family migration and women indentured labour. This approach differed according to the colony concerned. The increasing number of Indian women indentured immediately injected a new dynamism to the cultural creativity of the indentured population and the re-establishment of some of the norms of family.
The above is true for women across the Caribbean, Mauritius and Fiji. In the Caribbean and in Mauritius, the archives that have been preserved and the oral records and letters of these women provide touching testimony to how they preserved their individual religion and their culture, especially the Bhojpuri culture. Some writers have noted that in the Caribbean as well as in Mauritius the women came with two sarees, a lotta and a copy of the Tulidas Ramayana. It has been often noted "Indian culture was born and survived in the Caribbean out of this spiritual necessity of a community." We could add that this was largely due to the contribution of these indentured women.
(Bhaswati Mukherjee)
The author, a former diplomat, was Permanent Representative of India to UNESCO (2004-2010).
