In Exile at Home-A Fiji-Indian Story
Satish C. Rai
Submitted in part fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor in Creative Arts
Copyright © 2010 by Satish Rai
School of Humanities and Languages The University Western Sydney
Sydney May 2011
Declaration
I, Satish Rai, declare that the exegesis In Exile at Home-A Fiji-Indian Story is approximately 32,008 words in length including preface, notes, appendix, quotes and references. This thesis contains no material that has been previously submitted, in whole or in part, for the award of any other academic diploma or degree, except indicated otherwise. This thesis is my own work, based on the findings of my primary and secondary research which have been acknowledged.
Signature...... (Date) ……………………
Name: Satish Chand Rai
Student ID No: 96031605
Statement by Supervisor
The research in this exegesis was performed under my supervision and to my knowledge is the sole work of Mr. Satish Rai.
Signature...... (Date) …………………
Name…………………………………………………………………………………..
Designation……………………………………………………………………………
2 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The candidature would not have been successfully completed without assistance from many people around the world and I would like to extend my sincere gratitude to all them. Naming all of these people is not possible but I would like to acknowledge the following individuals who were at the forefront with their assistance and without whom this thesis may not have been realized. Firstly, my heart-felt gratitude to Associate Professor Judith Snodgrass, who provided much needed advice and guidance when the need was greatest. Professor Subramani is the only supervisor who supervised this candidature from its beginning to the end. His editorial support and comments, especially towards the final stages of the candidature, were crucial for its conclusion.
My appreciation goes to Dr Mary Greig, who supported my application for this candidature and guided me through its initial stages. My appreciation also goes to my other two supervisors; Professor Raja Jayaraman and Dr Anne Rutherford, for their support and guidance during the candidature. I also would like to thank Associate Professor Hart Cohen for his guidance, especially in the filmmaking component of the candidature.
A number of people assisted me during the film production component. Special thanks go to Anjula Ram for providing film production and post-production equipment, without which this film could not have been produced. I would like to acknowledge the support of Bisen Singh and Aslam Khan during filming in India. The following people provided support during filming in London: Mohammed Ahmedualla, Satnam Singh, Surinder Paul, Nigath Khan, Nayesh Radia, Dev Barrah and Parvinder Singh. Thank you all.
I acknowledge support of the following people for a month-long research and film production work in Fiji in June/July 2007. I thank Dr Ganesh Chand for sponsoring the project and the Government of Fiji for approving it. Jayant and Dr Shabnam Prakash for helping with accommodation and transport and Master Sukhdeo Singh for assisting with transport during filming of the Fiji component. A special thank you for Rajnel Prasad for
3 performing in the film and also for providing much needed assistance in casting other actors and assistance during filming. I would also like to acknowledge support of all the actors for their talents and time during rehearsals and filming. Very special thanks to the following academics and experts in the field of girmit in Fiji for providing their valuable time for pre-production interviews and for filming within little notice: Professor Vijay Mishra, Professor Brij V. Lal, Professor Satendra Nandan, Professor Vijay Naidu, Professor Biman Chand, Dr Ganesh Chand, Dr Shaista Shameem, Dr Mohit Prasad, Dr Umanand Prasad, Dr Som Prakash and Dr Abdul Kadir Buksh.
I would also like to thank Setareki Tale and the staff at the National Archives of Fiji for their support during the research and filming on the premises. I acknowledge the assistance and support provided by Dr Pavan Gupta during the middle part of this candidature and for his views on the rough cut stage of the film. A special acknowledgement to the late Dr Ahmed Ali for pointing out to me that approximately 40% of Fiji girmitiyas had returned to India. Without this knowledge, I would not have embarked upon this candidature.
My late father‘s dream for me was to become a doctor. He was happy when in 1976 I received a scholarship to study medicine at Fiji School of Medicine. Although he never said a word to me when I gave up medicine two years later, I know he was hugely disappointed. It was my desire to obtain a doctorate for my father that kept me going during some difficult periods during this candidature. Finally I may be able to fulfil his dream!
This thesis, however, is dedicated to all the girmitiyas for their hard work, sacrifices, pains and successes in Fiji. They gave me inspiration throughout this candidature and acted as a beacon in my life.
4 Table of contents
Preface 6
Introduction and Methodology 13
1–Exile Of Fiji Girmitiyas–The Main Subject Of The Film 17
2–Search For A Style For The Film 53
3–The Making Of The Film 72
4–Conclusion 85
Bibliography 90
Appendix 96
5 Preface
This DCA is essentially concerned with researching and making a film about the exile of approximately 60% of the indentured Indians laborers in Fiji who are now commonly known as girmitiyas. First let me briefly explain this term as it is repeated throughout this paper and the film. Girmit and girmitiya are derived from the word ”agreement‘ under which the Indian indentured laborers were taken to Fiji. They could not pronounce the word ”agreement‘, calling it —girmit“. The word became part of the local language and today the indenture system is referred to by most historians as the girmit system and the indentured laborers as girmitiyas.
To many descendants of Fiji‘s indentured Indian laborers, the word girmit and the girmitiyas meant little; the same was true for me for a major part of my early life. These terms began to have meaning for me when I started searching for my identity after feeling exiled in the United Kingdom after the two coups in Fiji in 1987. This study, therefore, is the result of a search for self-identity; it involved research into my girmit history. A chance discovery that some forty percent of Fiji‘s girmitiyas had returned to India ultimately led to an application for this doctoral research.
I was born in a little village of Natabua in Lautoka, the sugar city, which lies in the middle of the sugarcane belt in Viti Levu, the largest of some 300 islands that make the Republic of Fiji. The village lies in a valley, with a small hill flanking it on the Northwest and a river bordering it on the Southeast. During my childhood the village was comprised of some twenty household, all Indo-Fijians, a little more than fifty percent being Hindus and the rest Muslims. My childhood was mainly spent in this village, with occasional visits to relatives in nearby villages of Vaivai and Tawakubu and infrequent visits to the city, which lay some fifteen kilometers from our village. So I was basically shaped by the culture of my village.
6 Even after I started my secondary school education in the city, which lasted till 1975, contact outside the village was minimal. Apart from going to and from the school, I seldom went outside the village, except for visits to the city on weekends to watch Bollywood films and occasionally to play soccer. It was not until I received a scholarship to study medicine at the University of the South Pacific in 1976 that I went to the capital city, Suva, situated about 250 kilometers away on the opposite side of the island. All throughout this period I had never heard the words girmit or girmitiyas. I was however, aware that our ancestors were somehow linked to India because of references to Bharat (India) in the Holy Scriptures, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. I had started reading them at an early age and later encountered episodes from them in Bollywood mythologicals.
I had little understanding of the time or space that separated my ancestors from me and them from India. No one ever felt it necessary to explain to me, (or some thirty first cousins that lived together on our farmstead), about our girmitiya ancestors and I never had any reason to inquire about them. To me at that time, girmit and girmitiyas were non- issues, and India was a distant and exotic place from which our ancestors had ”fled‘ centuries ago. The notion was so vague that even when, during my childhood, I had talked to old Bhola, the only girmitiya that I have ever met in my life, I could not believe that he was actually born in India and had come to Fiji during the girmit era. Old Bhola looked like any of us but he spoke Hindi slightly differently and loved talking about his childhood in India. Most of my cousins ignored him; for some strange reason I felt pity on him and listened to his stories that made little sense to me at that time.
In 1979, as an undergraduate in Suva, I went to a park where the girmit centenary celebrations took place. Even then I did not properly understand why the celebrations were taking place; my reason for going to the celebrations was purely for entertainment. After I migrated to the United Kingdom in 1980, Fiji and girmit was thrust into the background as I got totally absorbed in making a home for my new family and myself there. It was not until 1987, by which time I had lost my family (through divorce) and my stable employment in the Metropolitan Police Service (through early retirement), that I
7 was rudely reminded of Fiji by the events of the 1987 military coups that were being beamed on the national TV channels in the United Kingdom. Fiji came into focus in my life once again.
When I had left Fiji in 1980 with my British wife, the agreement with her was that we would return to Fiji after five years, after some personal matters had been resolved. Unfortunately, the marriage ended in 1985, but not before two children had been added to the family. At that time I decided to postpone my return to Fiji until my children were older, when they would understand why I wanted to return to Fiji. However, the events of the two coups in Fiji in 1987 added another complication to my life: I felt that I could not return to Fiji until the political situation had improved dramatically, especially for the Indo-Fijian community who suffered the brunt of the coups. Thus I had to make a more permanent home for myself as I was forced into further exile in the United Kingdom.
Exile in the United Kingdom led me to research the girmit system. Through this research in 2003, I found that my ancestors, together with some 40,000 Fiji girmitiyas, may have actually been exiled in Fiji. No doubt my own exile made me think of the larger issue of exile of my own people. This discovery prompted me to the present research, which, as will be discussed in Chapter One, confirmed my initial suspicion in 2003 that circumstances may have forced the Indians to be exiled in Fiji. Working on the creative component of this project in the form of a ninety minute documentary film has further confirmed my thesis that the Fiji girmitiyas were in fact prevented from returning to their homes in India. I approached my subject with greater enthusiasm.
I believe that my professional and political activities in the United Kingdom between 1987 and 1995 had a direct bearing on my interest in the subject of the Fiji girmitiyas. I have already mentioned that I had little knowledge of the girmit or girmitiyas while I lived in Fiji. Had it not been for these political activities and events in the United Kingdom, I may never have had the interest to investigate the colonial legacy of girmit in Fiji. The
8 discovery that the Fiji girmitiyas were exiled, I believed would provide a challenge to the popular view that the girmitiyas had ”fled India‘ to for economic reasons.1
As I have already suggested, this research was substantially influenced by my post-1987 exile in the United Kingdom. My exposures to racism in the United Kingdom, especially in the Metropolitan police service, prompted me to investigate racism and racial discrimination there. I decided to complete the degree in Sociology that I had started in Fiji, and the study of Euro-centric race relations became the core subject in my thinking and influence in this and subsequent courses that I studied in the United Kingdom. I also joined the British Labour Party and was an elected member of the London Borough of Greenwich in 1990. I became an active member of the Black Section of the British Labour Party. In 1987 I joined the Greenwich Action Committee Against Racists Attacks (GACARA) as a committed volunteer worker.
As a part of my Sociology degree coursework, I researched the race relations policy and practices of the London Borough of Greenwich and, by the end of my degree, I discovered that the Borough had no properly formulated policies on the subject. I began working on this with the officers of the Greenwich Borough Council more effectively after I became the Vice-Chair of the Race Committee. The common objective was to develop a comprehensive race relations policy and an action plan for each of the main council departments. That is, the Housing, Social Services, Planning and the Leisure Services. By 1994, all these were accomplished and put in place in the Borough. This fact has been acknowledged by the Assistant Chief Executive of the London Borough of Greenwich Council, Mr. Harcourt Alleyene, in a video interview in February 2007.2
My political work with the British Labour Party, especially with the Black Section of the Labour Party, was an important factor in understanding the way the British style of party politics worked, especially how trade-offs were made for the sake of political expediency.
1 These popular views are explained below. 2 Filming of this video interview was for the DCA film In Exile at Home. However at the suggestion of my supervisors none of the interviews filmed in London was included in this film. However these interviews now appear in another documentary film that I have produced named Life in Exile (2009-50mins).
9 The research I undertook as part of my academic studies exposed me to the international labour movement, the history of African slavery and the Indian indenture labour system that followed the African slave system when it was abolished in 1838.
In 1993 I was appointed Principal Race Relations Officer in the London Borough of Newham‘s Chief Executives Department. My job involved researching and setting up a multi-agency project, and my tasks included recruiting, training and supervising community volunteers to provide support to the victims of racially-motivated crimes and harassment in the Borough. The package that I developed for the training of volunteers included an expose of the history of Eurocentric racial ideology that influenced racially- motivated crimes and harassment in the United Kingdom at that time. My work in this field influenced me to write a novel on the subject of the historical development of Eurocentric racial ideology and how that influenced the perpetrators and victims of racism in the United Kingdom.3 This novel, which was based on actual events, took me two years to write and influenced my later work on the Indian indenture system, especially Fiji‘s girmit system.
The research and the writing of this novel, which I later adapted into a stage play with another playwright, clarified for me the role of bonded labour, that is, the African slave labour and Indian indentured labour, during the European colonial expansion since 1492, when Christopher Columbus first voyaged to the West Indies. I was able to understand the reason why the Indian indenture system was started after the abolition of the African slave system and how it filled the labour vacuum when the majority of the former slaves refused to work for the colonial plantations after the abolition of Africa slavery in 1834.
The experience that I gained in the United Kingdom after 1987 proved vital to my understanding of Fiji‘s colonial history, which I further researched as part of my MA degree in Australia at the University of Western Sydney. Some of this research resulted in
3 Satish Rai, 1995, Silent Cries-A Journey through Four Continents, Sahara Publications, London.
10 the dissertation ”The Colonial Legacy and the Political Coups in Fiji‘ that I wrote in 1997 for the MA degree.
In 2003 I participated in the India Week celebrations in Fiji with Tourism India-Sydney. This experience gave me the necessary stimulus to think in terms of discovery of ”roots‘ and projection of my findings into the medium of documentary film. My participation included a week-long seminar in the Discover Indian Roots Project in the capital Suva and Lautoka city, and the launching of my first documentary film Milaap- Discover Your Indian Roots, made in 2001.
In the week-long seminar on the Discover Indian Roots Project, I provided information to some nine hundred people and assisted some sixty people to obtain Indenture Agreement Passes, through which present-day descendants can trace their ancestral roots in India. It was during one of my visits to the National Archives in Suva, which holds all the Immigration Passes of the Fiji girmitiyas, that the late Dr Ahmed Ali, a prominent researcher in Fiji‘s girmit history, informed me that most of the early Fiji girmitiyas had, in fact, returned home to India, before or after their girmit terms were over. He informed me that some 25,000 Fiji girmitiyas, making some forty percent of the total brought to Fiji, had returned, most of them during the early part of the girmit system in Fiji. At this meeting Dr Ali also informed me that he was engaged in research on Fiji‘s Muslim girmitiyas and requested that I investigate the reasons why the rest of the girmitiyas had not followed in the footsteps of these returnees.
Listening to Dr Ali, I realised that I had always been fed the popular information (or misinformation) that the Fiji girmitiyas had ”fled India‘ for a better life in Fiji or that they ”chose to remain in Fiji‘ after the girmit term had expired. Dr Ali had provided me with the stimulus to pursue another line of thinking that flowed against the popular knowledge that was available and current in Fiji. I decided to act on his suggestion to investigate this matter further.
11 The question foremost in my mind was: if most of the early Fiji girmitiyas had returned to India, why did the others not follow them? In other words, were there any dramatic changes in their circumstances that prevented them from returning to India, or compelled them not to? The secondary question in my mind was why hadn‘t earlier researchers and writers on Fiji‘s girmit system picked up on this very important information and investigated it? This DCA project examines the first question, which involves revisiting the available material on Fiji‘s girmit system and analyzing it in order to find an answer. In the process of this research and making of the film that will document the research and the history of Fiji‘s girmit system and the girmitiyas, I hope to find the answer to the second question as well.
As it should be evident now, my personal journey in the United Kingdom since 1987 has largely contributed to the research that I undertook as part of this project. I was able to draw on the knowledge and the skills that I had gained in that period to accomplish this project.
12 Introduction
This investigation attempts to reexamine Fiji‘s girmit history in order to find out why approximately 60% of Fiji girmitiyas did not return to their homes in India, and to present the findings in the form of a 45 minute documentary film. The initial task involves the investigation of Fiji‘s history to determine why approximately 35,000 (60%) of the original 60,500 girmitiyas did not return to their homes in India, as stipulated in their indenture agreement (girmit). Through this research, I hope to present a new thesis: that the majority of these girmitiyas were prevented from returning to India so that they could continue to provide cheap and much-needed labor on the sugarcane plantations in Fiji. I will also investigate how these girmitiyas made a home for themselves and their children in Fiji until the coups of 1987 in Fiji sent many of their descendants into exile from their adopted homes (a second exile of Indians of Fiji).
The second task involves researching documentary literature to decide the best way to present this information in the form of a documentary film. The third task is production of the documentary film itself based on the research on Fiji girmitiyas with the help of the selected documentary resources and any on-location adaptations required during the filming stage of the documentary. It may be appropriate to state here that I had a choice to undertake a conventional PhD or a Doctorate in Creative Arts, with a film component. I decided on the latter option because I wished to reach out to my target audience of Fijian people, members of the Indian diaspora, and the people of India as a whole through the medium of film and especially through DVDs and webcasting on internet.
I believe that many people in Fiji and in the Fijian diaspora are not aware of many aspects of Fiji‘s girmit history. This is maybe because this history has not been taught in Fiji‘s schools and universities. Most of the information is either kept in Fiji‘s National Archives or Museum and literature that are not widely available to the public. I believe that Fiji‘s girmit history has never been actively promoted in Fiji and with the post coup fragmentation of Indo-Fijian community; it now faces the danger of becoming forgotten
13 history of Fiji. You tube, Facebook and webcasting presents some of the ways to communicate with this fragmented and distraught community.
The Girmit diaspora, which includes former European colonies such as Mauritius, Guyana, Trinidad & Tobago, Surinam, French Reunion, South Africa, Jamaica and Fiji, shares many experiences of the Indian indenture System. Unfortunately there has not been much communication among these communities on girmit and the aftermath of girmit experiences. Similarly, there has not been much communication or interaction between India and the girmit diaspora since the abolition of the indenture system in 1921. Generally the exiled girmitiyas had to fend for themselves in the colonies. With passage of time and because of the distances involved between India and the girmit disapora, the people and experiences of girmit have become distant memories for majority of Indians in India and the Indian diaspora. This film is a small start to a massive task of reaching out to these audiences and educating them about Fiji‘s girmit experience.
My primary intention is to convey my research findings to this audience taking advantage of the possibilities offered by the various electronic and internet technologies for the dissemination of film. This is a DCA produced within the School of Humanities, a history told through film rather than though the more conventional textual mode, with the aim of maximizing its dissemination. I have taken into consideration that a fair percentage of my target audience is not proficient in English language, especially in India, where illiteracy rate among rural population is still high. On the other hand film viewing, especially Bollywood films is a tradition in India for nearly one hundred years and in Fiji since 1930s. 4 Considering these factors I believe that disseminating the message of my thesis in form of a film to my target audience is prudent than in form of a book or other written text.
The fact that I have a background in independent film and community television and possess film production equipment and all the basic film production skills have also been
4 Vijay Mishra, 2001, Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire, (pp. xi & xviii-xix), Routledge, London.
14 motivating factors in my decision. I felt that I had means and skills to make a documentary film which will be able to convey my findings to the intended audience better and more conveniently.
My main intention of producing this film is to educate my audience about the new information that I have discovered about the girmit and girmitiyas of Fiji. It is also my hope that some people will be moved enough to engage in some form of political activities to honor and seek justice for the injustices committed against the girmitiyas. Prime among these objectives is seeking apology and reparation from those who were responsible for the mistreatment and exile of the girmitiyas.
The title In Exile At Home is the title of the exegesis as well as of the film. The first chapter of the exegesis deals with the subject of the film, that is, the research on the exile of girmitiyas. The second chapter investigates what resources documentary literature provided me with to make In Exile at Home and the third chapter explains how these resources were used to produce the documentary film.
Methodology
As stated above, this DCA candidature consists of two research projects and production of a documentary film. The first task for me was to workout the methodology for this enquiry. As the production of documentary film contributes towards 70% of this candidature I made it the central project around which other projects were constructed. The two main research projects were undertaken simultaneously. The first research project was designed to provide the basic information on which the initial script for the documentary film was written. This research was guided by the core question the documentary wished to explore; that is, the reason or reasons why some 60% of Fiji‘s approximately 60,500 girmitiyas did not return to their homes in India as approximately 25,000 of their compatriots did. This research comprised of reviewing existing literature on Fiji‘s girmit system and girmitiyas with emphasis on post-colonial reexamination of the same in order to find the answer to the core question of this candidature. During this
15 research, I used the tools I had discovered in documentary literature review to reconsider Fiji‘s girmit history. This initial research was supplemented by further field research in Fiji during the filming phase of the documentary in July and August 2007. This research was conducted in form of interviews with prominent scholars and academics in Fiji, archival searches and location investigations such as coolie lines where girmitiyas had originally lived during the girmit period.
The second research project consisted of a review of the literature of documentary films. This literature review was done with two main purposes. Firstly, I searched for the theoretical underpinning and style for my film from the multitude of documentary styles and theories that exists today. Secondly, I was identifying tools to assist in a review of Fiji‘s colonial history and creative ways to provide a voice for the girmitiyas in the film.
The production of the documentary film developed gradually and was informed by these two research projects, as later chapters will explain. The initial treatment was refined several times and eventually a script was written after the conclusion of the research. The script was further modified after the field studies and filming in India and Fiji. The field study in Fiji was successful, to a large extent helped by the information gathered in both these researches. They were instrumental in providing tools to reconsider Fiji‘s girmit history and in designing appropriate interview questions. These questions elicited answers from the interviewees which by and large provided support to the initial thesis that the 60% of Fiji‘s girmitiyas were exiled in Fiji.
In accordance with the original script, filming was first done in India and London. After further refinement of the script, the rest of the primary filming was done in Fiji. A rough cut of the film footage was undertaken in Sydney and the final script was prepared. Then the narration scenes were filmed. After that the fine cut was completed and rest of post- production was completed. For feedback, the film was then screened to several groups of friends and colleagues in the Liverpool area and the final cut, incorporating some of the feedback, was then completed.
16 Chapter 1-The exile of Fiji girmitiyas –the main subject of the film
The aim of this chapter is to find an answer to the question of why approximately 35,000 girmitiyas did not return to India in the footsteps of some 25,000 compatriots who did. The findings of this research formed the basis for writing the initial script for the documentary film as well as for further research in Fiji. The final script was written in Fiji after conclusion of the field research.
The topic has been largely unexamined since K.L. Gillion explored the subject in his books some decades ago.5 Writing about the Indian diaspora more recently, Vijay Mishra categorises the overseas Indians into two groups, the older plantation diaspora of classic capitalism, and the mid-to late twentieth-century diaspora of advanced capitalism to the metropolitan centres of the empire.6 The recruitment of girmitiyas to Fiji was a part of the transportation of labour from India to the older diaspora of classic capitalism which included British and other European colonies such as Mauritius, Trinidad and Tobago, South Africa, Guyana and Surinam. Recruitment to sugar plantations in these colonies started in 1834, after the abolition of African slavery, and ended with the last shipment to Fiji in 1916. The Indo-Fijian historian Brij V. Lal states: Our forebears were a part of the massive migration of Indian indentured labour which began with Mauritius in 1834 and continued until the early years of the 20th century. By then, over a million had crossed the oceans to the ”King Sugar‘ colonies scattered around the globe.7
5 K .L. Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge to European Dominance, p. 5, Australian National University Press, Canberra and K.L. Gillion, (1962) Fiji‘s Indian Migrants–A History to the end of indenture in 1920, (p.190) Oxford University Press London. 6 Vijay Mishra, (1992), —The Diasporic Imaginary Theorizing the Indian diaspora“. In The Post-Colonial Studies Reader, ed. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin, (p.447), Routledge, London and New York. 7 Brij Lal, (2008) The Hague Immigration Lecture, Marking the 135th Anniversary of the Arrival of Indian People in Suriname, http://www.gopio.net/publications_articles/The_Hague_Immigration_Lecture_brij_lal.pdf .
17
The transportation of girmitiyas to Fiji started in 1879 and a total of 60,500 girmitiyas were transported in 87 shipments over this period.8 After completing their indenture, some of them started to settle down as citizens of the colony. However, according to late Ahmed Ali, approximately 25,000 of these girmitiyas returned to their homes in India. Literature research has shown that in spite of references by a number of post-colonial writers such as Lal (1997) to the 25,000 girmitiyas who returned to India, little has been written about the reasons why they did return to India. Much less has been written about why the remaining 35,000 girmitiyas did not return to Indian like their compatriots did. One exception is K. L. Gillion, a colonial writer, who has devoted many chapters in his two books (1967, 1977) to these two aspects of Fiji girmitiyas. It is a mystery why those who have researched Fiji girmit system and the girmitiyas did not pay much attention to his work on the exile of the girmitiyas. Unfortunately his works on exile of Fiji girmitiyas lay buried in library shelves for more than a half century. Instead a myth has been propagated that the girmitiyas —chose to stay in Fiji.“ Laura Marks states that a crucial part of post colonial history is research of what she calls ”fossils‘.
We are constantly discovering inexplicable factoids on the surface of represented history that invites us to cut through the layers and connect them to their sources, cutting between private recollection and the official discourse.9
One such baffling factoid is the belief among the majority of Indo-Fijians that most of the girmitiyas —chose to stay in Fiji“. It was generally written by academics and opinion- makers (and believed by the public) that these girmitiyas deliberately ”chose to stay in Fiji‘. This is demonstrated in the writing of arguably Fiji‘s most respected researcher on Fiji girmitiyas, the historian, Brij Lal. For example in an article written by him in 2003 for Migration Policy Institute of Washington, USA, he wrote ”most of the migrants chose to
8 Brij V. Lal, 1983, Girmitiyas--The Origins of the Fiji Indians, (p.98), ANU Printing Services, Canberra. 9 Laura Marks, 2000, Skin of the film: Intercultural Cinema, (p.91), Duke University Press, London.
18 remain in the islands after the expiration of their five-year contracts‘.10 Explaining the reason why the girmitiyas were ”banished‘ to Fiji Lal states:
But the evidence above shows that the overwhelming majority were young, productive agricultural workers from a fair cross-section of rural Indian society who had fallen on hard times and who chose to migrate temporarily to alleviate their plights.11
It appears that the expressions —chose to migrate“ and —chose to stay“ gained currency through the writings of Lal. He was not alone in propagating this myth. Ahmed Ali, in his early work, states that ”most of these remained to establish a new and permanent home in the Pacific‘.12 However in the next paragraph he writes: ”For most, girmit was narak (hell) because life on an indenture plantation constituted a form of human degradation‘.13 One wonders why the girmitiyas would choose to stay in narak (hell). In fact there are many such contradictions in the writings on girmit by Fiji writers. Ali also writes that ”In its agreement with India, Fiji expressed a willingness to permit Indians to reside in Fiji permanently and to facilitate their settlement there‘.14 He then writes that ”Indians had made a conscious act in migrating to seek security and this they desired not merely for themselves but for their descendants as well.‘15 As will be seen below, the truth about how and why the girmitiyas ended up staying permanently in Fiji is far from these assertions by Ali.
This myth was also propagated by Robert Norton when, writing about the history of settlement of girmitiyas in Fiji, he stated that ”Most chose to stay after their labour
10 Brij V. Lal, 2003, http://www.migrationinformation.org/Profiles/display.cfm?ID=110 Migration Policy Institute. 11 Brij V. Lal, Fiji Girmitiyas: the background to Banishment. In Vijay Mishra, (Ed), 1979, Rama‘s Banishment A centenary Tribute to the Fiji Indians 1879–1979, p. 24 Heinemann Educational books, London. 12 Ahmed Ali, Fiji Indian Politics. In Vijay Mishra, In Vijay Mishra, (Ed), 1979, Ram‘s Banishment A centenary Tribute to the Fiji Indians 1879–1979, p. 66 Heinemann Educational books, London. 13 Ali, Fiji Indian Politics. In Vijay Mishra, (Ed), 1979, Ram‘s Banishment, (p. 66) 14 Ali, Fiji Indian Politics. In Vijay Mishra, (Ed), 1979, Ram‘s Banishment, (p. 66) 15 Ali, Fiji Indian Politics. In Vijay Mishra, (Ed), 1979, Ram‘s Banishment, (p. 68)
19 contracts expired…‘16 The latest writer to propagate this myth is Dr Kamlesh Chand (2010) in his novel Gulami: Slavery in Fiji in which he wrote: The great majority of Girmitiyas (Indentured Labourers) opted to stay. They had usually lost contact with their families back home in India as they were generally illiterate. Those who did go back were not accepted into their uncompromising and respective caste systems. This was because they had mixed with people of other castes and were no longer considered ”pure‘ and acceptable.17
This myth, for me, was partly shattered by my discovery in 2003 that some forty percent of the Fiji girmitiyas had returned to their homes in India. As argued here the truth about the girmitiyas‘ attempts to return to India was well documented by Gillion in his two books (dealt with in some detail below) but for some reason, this information failed to circulate since the publication of these books in 1962 and 1973. However, this chance discovery in 2003 compelled me to search for the truth about the girmit history in Fiji. Marks statement that ”…once caught in this pursuit to find the truth, the researcher discovers that his or her own history is based on partial truth‘,18 hold very true in this case. Once this happens, ”…the researcher is compelled to examine more thoroughly the historical material, looking for clues that would guide him or her to the truth‘.19
Until Ahmed Ali informed me that 25,000 girmitiyas had returned to India (he may have discovered this fact in his later research), I also believed that girmitiyas had migrated to Fiji willingly and most of them did not return, choosing to remain in Fiji for a better life. The new information contradicted this belief and acted like a catalyst to find out why the 35,000 girmitiyas did not return to their homes in India. The main question to explore was whether these girmitiyas chose to make a home for themselves in Fiji or they made a
16 Robert Norton, 1977, Race and Politics in Fiji, p. 7, University of Queensland Press, Queensland. 17 Kamlesh Sharma, 2010, Gulami Slavery in Fiji, p. 18, KPS Publications, Canberra. 18 Laura Marks, 2000, Skin of the film: Intercultural Cinema, p. 91, Duke University Press, London. 19 Marks, Skin of the film, 2000, p. 91.
20 home in Fiji because they were somehow prevented from returning to India, thus making a home in exile. Let me briefly discuss how I have used —home‘ and ”exile‘ in this work. David Morley, Professor of Communications at the Goldsmiths College, London, challenged established meanings attached to the concepts of ”home‘ and ”exile‘ stating that there are many narratives of home and belonging and many conflicts over the construction of the binary ”citizen/exile‘. He defines ”home‘ as: ”…a place, region or state to which one properly belongs, on which one's affections centre, or where one finds refuge, rest or satisfaction.20 Post-colonial writers and researchers on girmit in Fiji, such as Brij Lal, Vijay Naidu and Satendra Nandan, have stated in the film In Exile at Home that generally girmitiyas were deceived in leaving their homes in India to work in Fiji. And because they agreed (by putting their thumbprint on agreements written in English that they did not understand) to go to Fiji for a period of five and ten years only; that indicated they were leaving their home temporarily. Gillion (1977) writes:
Most of the recruits were just looking for work or a way out of difficulties. They did not think themselves as emigrants bound for a land of better opportunity, and they had little understanding of the forces that had driven them from the villages and were to mould their future lives.21
For them India was their home, a place to which they properly belonged and shared their affections with their loved ones. It was the centre of their world. Gillion further states that:
The anticipated emigration of enterprising people anxious to improve their prospects by going to the colonies became in practice the collection by any means of stray, isolated, and credulous villagers who had not slightest idea of what their contracts would really mean: the great distance from India, the relentless, clock work, pace of plantation work under harsh discipline, inability to change their employer, the
20 David Morley, 2000, Home Territories Media, Mobility and Identity, p. 132, Rutledge: London. 21 K. L. Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge to European Dominance, p. 5, Australian National University Press, Canberra.
21 beatings, and the penal sanctions used to enforce compliance and even to prolong their indentures.22
A survey of relevant literature does not suggest that, in terms of regarding India as their home, the 60% of the girmitiyas, who remained in Fiji permanently, were in any significant way different from those who had returned. For them Fiji could not have been a place to which they properly belonged, nor a place where their affections centered. In this case they could not have found refuge, rest or satisfaction in Fiji as their home in their heart was India. This thesis and the film argue that these girmitiyas were reluctant exiles, deceived by colonial bureaucrats in both India and Fiji, and executives of the Colonial Sugar Refining (CSR) Company, into staying permanently in Fiji. As Satendra Nandan writes:
They had little idea of geography, less of history. Many were told Fiji was a ”tapu‘, in the Bay of Bengal. They had no conception of a Bay or a Beach for they had never seen a sea-wave or a ship. They were in their teens when they embarked on Leonidas in 1879. They arrived, the first ones, in Fiji waters on 14 May. And over the next forty years, in 87 ships, more than 60,000 men, women, children were transported and transplanted on the islands. And most never returned: even Valmiki and Vyasa couldn‘t imagine such an exile in their epics.23
In his article, ”Reflection on Exile‘ Edward Said states: Although it is true that anyone prevented from returning home is an exile, some distinctions can be made among exiles, refugees, expatriates and émigrés. Exile originated in the age-old practices of banishment. Once banished, the exile lives an anomalous and miserable life, with the stigma of being an outsider.24
22 Gillion 1973, Fiji Indian Challenge (p. 5). 23 Satendra Nandan 2010 in an unpublished article Literature in Freedom & Exile: An Australasian Journey, University of Fiji, Lautoka, Fiji. 24 Edward Said, 2001, Reflection on Exile‘ in Reflections on Exile and other Literary and Cultural Essays, p. 181 London: Granta Books.
22 He goes on to define and distinguish refugees, expatriates and émigrés from exiles, all of whom leave their homes to live in another state or country. I feel that Said‘s definition of exile–that ”anyone prevented from returning home is an exile‘–applies very well to the Indian exiles in Fiji. Let me elaborate.
The term exile has gained currency in terms of Fiji girmitiyas recently and it has been used quite frequently by one of Fiji‘s most respected writers and academics, Satendra Nandan. He uses this term in relation to the girmitiyas as well as their descendants who now live away from Fiji (since the coups of 1987), as also those who remain in Fiji.25
The exile of 35,000 girmitiyas
K. L. Gillion, in his books Fiji‘s Indian Migrants (1967) and The Fiji Indians (1973) provides sufficient evidence to conclude that the majority of Fiji girmitiyas were prevented from returning to India. I might reiterate here for the sake of highlighting my argument that it is a mystery to me how and why others before me have not felt it necessary to highlight this aspect of girmit. Arguably Brij Lal was the most likely historian to investigate this, not only because he did his PhD research on Fiji girmit (1978- 1983), but also because Gillion was his mentor. Lal produced his PhD thesis in form of his first book on girmit in 1983 (Girmitiyas: The Origins of the Fiji Indians) and subsequently has ”…written or edited four books and published no fewer that 16 articles and chapters on this subject.26 However Lal failed to examine the reasons why 40% of the girmitiyas returned to Fiji and more importantly, why the rest remained in Fiji. This is very surprising because, in his works on Fiji girmit he has detailed the extreme hardship the girmitiyas had faced, including the death of 1180 girmitiyas from 1900 to 1909, ”…in what is considered to be the better years of indenture‘.27 He has noted that ”…the girmitiyas called it ”narak‘ which means hell, an experience which robbed them of ”izzat‘,
25 Satendra Nandan also speaks about exile of Indians in Fiji in the film In Exile at Home (2007). 26 Brij Lal (Ed), 2000, Chalo Jahaji on a journey through indenture in Fiji, p. 3 ANU, Canberra. 27 Lal, 2000, Chalo Jahaji, pp. 291-321.
23 honour, which denied them ”insaf‘, justice‘.28 He also noted that (presumably basing his information from the works of Gillion), that ”altogether, 24,000 laborers returned to India after spending varying period in the colony‘,29 thus escaping the narak. He states that ”…the majority stayed on, attracted by new opportunities, a greater sense of personal freedom, inertia, or a dread of going back to the patterns of a rigidly organised village life in India‘ …”an intended temporary journey often became a permanent exile.‘30 It is possible that Lal had not read or mis-read the substantial work that his mentor Gillion had done on the issue of repatriation and exile of the Fiji girmitiyas. Otherwise he would not have concluded that ”…migrants chose to remain in the islands after the expiration of their five-year contracts‘. In his self-acknowledged last work on Fiji girmitiyas Lal has accepted that ”…I have only just scratched the surface of what is simply a vast, inexhaustible field‘, and that ”Old evidence viewed with fresh eyes and probed with new questions will yield new results and provoke further research.‘31 I believe the evidence on the drama of the exile of the girmitiyas is contained in the two works of K.L. Gillion and I have relied on these to provide information on the exile of Fiji girmitiyas.
Gillion (1962) informs us that ”…up to 15 May 1957, there were 32,995 repatriates, of whom 24,000 were born in India thus about 40 percent of the immigrants had gone back to India.32 In Appendix J to Departures of Indians from Fiji (to 1920) he provides annual return figures from 1881 to 1920. The total is 20,229, with an average of 500 girmitiyas returning each year, except in 1920 when 4,741 returned.33 In his second book on this subject he states that ”…from April to October 1921, about 6,500 repatriates were met on arrival…‘ in Calcutta.34 This takes the total of girmitiyas who returned to India to 26,726. Gillion does suggest that these figures, derived from collated information in the Fiji
28 Lal, 2000, Chalo Jahaji, p. x. 29 Brij Lal, 1992, Broken Waves a History of the Fiji Indians in the Twentieth Century, p. 39, University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu. 30 Lal, 2000, Chalo Jahaji, p. 132. 31 Lal, 2000, Chalo Jahaji, p.xii. 32 K.L. Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants–A History to the end of indenture in 1920, p. 190, Oxford University Press London. 33 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 217. 34 Gillion, 1973, Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 64.
24 Labour Department, must be treated as approximates only.35 It generally accepted that approximately 25,000 girmitiyas had returned to India.36
This section is about strategies adopted by the Colonial Government of Fiji and the Colonial Sugar Refining Company (CSR Company), in collaboration with the India Office in London and Colonial Government of India, to deprive the girmitiyas of their right of free passage back to India after completion of the indenture agreement (girmit) in Fiji.
It appears that Governor Gordon had intended to keep majority of the girmitiyas permanently in Fiji, despite the written agreement to provide free passage to all of them back to India after ten years of indenture. This is reflected in Gillion‘s statement: Gordon placed great value to provisions that the right to a free passage would accrue only after ten years‘ residence, and he expected three- quarters of the immigrants to stay, an estimate based on West Indian experience. The expectation that the Indians would remain in the colony was Gordon‘s justification of the high cost of their introduction and of the government subsidy of one-third, which was not offered to Island immigrants.37
This assertion by Gillion demonstrates deceipt on part of Gordon in respect to his intention towards treatment of girmitiyas from the beginning of the indenture system in Fiji. The terms of Indian indenture in Fiji is very explicit. Gillion writes: Under the agreements signed in India, the emigrants bound themselves to serve for five years under assigned employer, with penal sanctions for breaches of labour dsipline. They were then free to return to India at their own expense or stay in Fiji, and after another five years they were entitled to an optional free return passage to India.38
35 Gillion 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants p. 217. 36 Gillion‘s figures does not include any children of the girmitiyas born in Fiji 37 Gillion, 1967, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 16. 38 Gillion, 1967, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 16.
25 The indenture agreement is very clear that the girmitiyas had the right to return to India after completing five years of indenture in Fiji (by paying their own passage back) or after after ten years when the Government of Fiji was obliged to provide free passage back to India for girmitiyas plus any children born in Fiji. I will consider later a very significant change to the indenture term that happened in 1906, which in 1929, helped to finally exile the girmitiyas permanently in Fiji.39
It is apparent that Gordon was dubious in his intention regarding their permanent stay in Fiji. Even Lord Salisbury from the India Office in London ”…suggested: that emigration should be encouraged, not just tolerated, by the Government of India, and should develop into permanent colonisation through elimination of return passage‘.40
This was not the only deceit that the Colonial Government of Fiji and the CSR embarked on in this respect. There were many other in terms of recruiting the girmitiyas, vast majority of them were teenagers and young men and women (only 5.1% were over 30 years old),41 who were tricked or seduced by the arkatis (the recruiters) away from their homes in India.42 According to Gillion one offiical who had made a special study of colonial emigration confided that: Let it be remembered that the agent is at Calcutta and it is representated in the recriuting-grounds by men for the most part unscrupulous scoundrels. As it is, the recruiters too often dupe ignorant countrymen and countrywomen into the belief that it is the order of Government that they should emigrate,…43
While the hidden agenda of Gordon, backed by the India office in London, appeared to be to recruit, by whatever means, a substantial number of girmitiyas and transport them for hard labour and eventual permanent colonisation in Fiji, there was no desire on the part of Indians to migrate, not until they came into contact with the artkatis, away from their
39 Gillion, 1967, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 191. 40 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, pp.21-22. 41 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 210. 42 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, pp. 29-38. 43 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 26.
26 homes. Gillion writes that ”there was strong repugnance to emigration in north India… In fact, without the stimulus of organized recruiting the volume of emigration from the north would have been negligible, except from Punjab. The Fiji Government Emigration Agent wrote in 1896: Emigration of any kind, above all that to the other colonies beyond the seas, is most unpopular. In many villages the recruiters dare not show himself for fear of personal violence, and everywhere he is the prey of the police and court officials of lower grades. The Indian peasant will not emigrate excepting he is actually compelled by stress of circumstances: he prefers to struggle on his native villages, a victim of ever present poverty varied by seasons of actual want. Bearing all this in mind it is to me almost surprising that the emigrant to colonies is so satisfactory.44
We know from Gillion that the girmitiyas were reluctant to migrate and, in all probability, they were hoodwinked by the artkatis when they were away from their homes.45 According to Gillion many were recruited in this way from the districts of Allahbad, Banaras, and Kanpur. He states that: These cities were magnets for the unemployed, the curious, the adventurous, the despossessed, and the runaway, for Kanpur and Allahbad were manufacturing centres, ancient Banaras, the most holy city of Hindus, on the River Ganga, a pilgrim centre, and Allahbad too, especially during the great melas (fairs). In these districts the percentage of recruits who were native residents was often as low as 10 percent.46
Unlike the majority of migrants who left Europe to settle in America, the Indians did not intend to settle in a new country. The Sanderson Committee wrote in 1910:
44 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 36. 45 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 46. 46 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 47.
27 It seems doubtful whether the majority of the migrants leaving India fully realised the conditions of the new life before them or start with the deliberate intention of making for themselves a home in a new country.47
This suggests that the girmitiyas did not leave India to settle permanently in Fiji. Even a report from The Government of India noted that ”although number of emigrants return annually from the colonies, bringing with them in many instances large accumulated savings, no percepible stimulus to emigrate appears to result.48
It is clear that when the girmitiyas left their villages for the cities for whatever reason, they had not heard about Fiji, and nor did they have any intention to emigrate there. Even when they were trapped by the arkatis in the cites and towns, they were not told the whole truth. Gillion explains in detail how they were taken from their towns and villages to Calcutta or Madras from where they were transported to Fiji.49 Even in these port cities the girmitiyas were not told the whole truth, that they were leaving their homeland for good once the ship carrying sailed into the wide sea. On the high sea their fates were sealed and but Gillion states that ”nearly all expected to return to India after a few years. 50
In the beginning nearly half of the girmitiyas were returning to India after completion of their five or ten year contracts. According to the figures provided by Gillion an average of 500 girmitiyas were returning to India annually until 1916. In the years 1894 and 1914 more than 1,067 and 1,256 repectively returned to India.51 Many of the girmitiyas were returning to India by paying their own fares; they did not wait in Fiji for ten years to take advantage of the free passage back. Gillion states that ”by 1907,…at least one-third of the repatriates were paying their own fares; over the whole indenture period, the proportion was about one-quarter‘.52 The girmitiyas were returning despite Gordon and the India
47 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 41. 48 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 41. 49 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, pp. 19-38. 50 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 42. 51 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 217. 52 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 191.
28 office‘s designs to settle the majority of the girmitiyas in Fiji. And the Government of Fiji did try to stop these girmitiyas from returning to India, even when they paid their own fare. Gillion states that: ”In 1885 the Fiji Government refused to allow certain immigrants to return before they had ten years in Fiji, arguing that it would not pay the colony to bring them for a shorter period…53
After a girmitiya had served his /her five year‘s service under indenture, and any extentions of time imposed as penalty by a court, he or she would receive a certificate and he was then a khula (free) person. Those who could pay their fare back to India did so and returned; but others had to wait for another five years to take advantage of a free passage back for themselves and their children to return. For Gordon and his successors and the CSR Company, this period in girmitiyas‘ life was crucial in terms of their permanent settlement in Fiji. The girmitiyas had to spend a further five years in Fiji and this was an opportune time for the authorities in Fiji to persuade, tempt or compel them to settle in Fiji permanently. Gillion reiterates that: ”Although most of these had not originally intended to settle abroad permanently, settlement had always been envisaged by the promoters of the indenture labour system‘.54
The colonial government and the CSR would have preferrred the khula (free) girmitiyas to re-indenture themselves when they finished their indenture, as it was expensive to replace them with fresh immigrants, but most of them did not want to go back to the plantations, similar to the free Negro slaves after slavery was abolished. Gillions states that ”Although bonuses and land were offered as inducements, there were few takers; in 1893 only 208 men were serving under re-indenture and 515 at the end of 1912‘.55 When re-indenture did not work and fearing that more grimitiyas would return, the Fiji Government offered land for them to settle in Fiji. It began to acquire Fijian land for their settlement and according to Gillion: In 1889 the Indians who had arrived on the Leonidas became eligible for repatriation. Considering that it was ”eminently desirable that Indian
53 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 190. 54 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 137. 55 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 138.
29 immigrants should settle in this Colony if so disposed‘, the government advertised that the return passage right could be exchanged for a lease of up to five acres of land and goods to the value of 12 pounds per adult and 6 pounds per child. There were no applications… 56
Governor O‘Brien decided that more needed to be done to induce girmitiyas to settle in Fiji and established an Indian Settlement Fund to acquire land from Fijians for their settlement at low rentals. The CSR also encouraged girmitiyas to settle in Lautoka. The girmitiyas had to spend five years in Fiji and slowly they began leasing land from the Government, the CSR and Fijian landowners. They built temporary homes on these lands, in anticipation that they would return to India when they were eligible for the free fare. Gillion states that:
The typical situation in this period was one of individual family units…, with few of the remoter kinship ties, little if any recognized pattern of authority or associations, and considerable movement because a large number returning to India. 57
This suggests that the girmitiyas were not willing to establish a permanent home in Fiji because they wanted to return to India at the first opportunity. Gillion states the reasons for their continued departure to India:
Life for most ordinary villagers in India provided satisfactions and dissatisfactions of human condition, including a recognised place in family and society. It was these that were lacking for many in Fiji. Family life was unstable, wives were hard to find and keep, the old social order had ceased to exist for the immigrants on the day they were recruited. They had lost respect, honour, hierarchy, and warmth of belonging they had known in village India, and their poverty was less bearable.58
56 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 139. 57 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 145. 58 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 7.
30 It appears that the girmitiyas, contrary to popular belief propagated in Fiji, chose to leave Fiji and return to their villages. On the other hand, it is clear that the Government of Fiji and the CSR Company were desperate to keep the majority of the girmitiyas in Fiji, a battle they were clearly losing at the turn of the twentieth century, as Gillion‘s figures show. However, the CSR Company and the Government of Fiji were about to face a greater problem in the form of demands for abolition of the indenture system not only in Fiji but also in other colonies. If the flow of girmitiyas from Fiji at that time remained unchecked then soon after abolition of girmit Fiji would lose the majority of its labour force. This would be disastrous not only for the CSR Company but also for the economy of Fiji, which depended upon the continued existence of the CSR Company in Fiji.59
The call for abolition of the girmit system in Fiji came mainly from people in India itself, although The Anti-Slavery and Aborigines‘ Protection Society in London were also involved. In India national leaders such as Gopal Krishna Gokhale, M.M. Malaviya, Mahatma Gandhi, C.F. Andrews and Banarasidas Chaturvedi were the leading advocates of ending girmit. In Fiji reports of the evils of girmit from J.W. Burton, Hannah Dudley and Totaram Sanadhya had considerable impact in India and provided ammunition for its abolition. Gillion provides details of the abolition struggle which resulted in end to recruitment of girmitiyas in 1916 and abolition of girmit in 1921.60 The details of this struggle should not detain us here; but how the girmitiyas ended up remaining permanently in Fiji will be discussed below. That this happened despite girmitiyas‘ desire to go back to India, and Government of India‘s repeated calls to Government of Fiji to honour their indenture agreement and send them back, is the amazing story of deception outlined below.
This story of deception involves the Colonial Government of Fiji, the CSR Company and the India Office in London on the one hand, The Colonial Government of India and the anti-indenture movement on the other hand, with the girmitiyas in Fiji caught in the
59 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, pp. 164-197. 60 For details of abolition struggle of Fiji‘s girmit see Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, pp. 164-197 and Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, pp. 7-101.
31 middle, waiting desperately to return home to India. This drama started in the first decade of the twentieth century and ended in 1929, by which time approximately thirty thousand girmitiyas realized that they had permanently lost their free passage back to India. With little money saved to pay fares for their children and themselves to India, they realised they would have to remain permanently in Fiji. Thus Governor Gordon‘s initial plan to permanently settle 75% of the girmitiyas was finally being realised, although the figure was reduced to only 60%. In this international battle, the Colonial Government of Fiji, the CSR Company and the India Office in London won, the Colonial Government of India and the anti-indenture movement managed to abolish indenture system, but approximately 35,000 Fiji girmitiyas lost their rights to free passage back to their homes in India. Below is a brief summary of this drama; Gillion provides fuller details.
An important part of this drama is a change in the indenture agreement that took place in 1906. Gillion states:
The government regarded the cost of repatriation as a heavy burden on the colony and tried on several occasions to restrict the right…In 1905 it secured the approval of the Government of India to restrict the repatriation rights of all future immigrants. In order to delimit the liability of the Fiji Government, Ordinance V111 (1906) laid down that Indians arriving after 31 May 1906 (the so called second series immigrants) could keep open their rights to free passage for only two years after it accrued, that is, they could claim it only within twelve years upon arrival. … After 1906, too, return passages were not to be given to the children of immigrants who had reached twenty four-years if born in India, or twelve years if born in Fiji, as this was considered to be unfair to the colony.61
Effectively this Ordinance severely restricted repatriation rights of the girmitiyas, especially if they were not informed of these change during recruitment in India. Gillion states:
61 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 191.
32 The anticipated emigration of enterprising people anxious to improve their prospects by going to colonies became the practice of collecting by any means of stray, isolated, and credulous villages who had not the slightest idea of what their contracts would really mean:.. 62
If the second series girmitiyas were not informed of these changes or did not understand what they really meant, the chances were that they would believe that they had indefinite right of passage back to India and would not see urgency in returning with the two year time frame stipulated in the contract. According to Gillion a total of 29,366 girmitiyas were transported to Fiji after the 1905 Ordinance came into effect and total of 35,020 girmitiyas were exiled in Fiji after 1929, the year the second series of girmitiyas, under this Ordinance, lost their rights to free passage to India. It appears that this Ordinance played a crucial role in the eventual exile of the girmitiyas, and set the stage for this socio- political drama.
By 1905 the CSR Company had monopoly on the sugar industry and were the de-facto rulers of Fiji.63 The CSR Company and the Colonial Government of Fiji became aware of the impending abolition of the Indian indenture system and realised the grave danger of the sugar industry collapsing in Fiji. The CSR Company officials felt that ”although the abolition of indenture system would inevitably spell loss for the company,‘64 it could survive by encouraging the khula (free) girmitiyas to produce cane on leased lands. So it tried harder to retain the khula girmitiyas in the country ”by employing them as unindentured labourers, or selling them on the land, and in 1912, as an experiment, divided Vucimaca plantation, in the Rewa district, into small holdings of about four acres of improved cane land for leasing to Indians.65
According to Gillion, the CSR Company ”helped the government to awaken the planters to the danger before them‘…because ”unbeknown to the government one of these agents was
62 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 5. 63 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, pp. 8-9. 64 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p.171. 65 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p.171.
33 reporting directly to the Company. Two of its principal officers (Edward Knox and Thomas Hughes) had longer experience of Indian immigration than any planter or government officials in Fiji‘.66 Thomas Hughes visited India six or seven times and reported back to the CSR Company about the growing opposition to the indenture system in India.
By 1912 opposition to the indenture system had taken national importance in India. In March 1912, a prominent Indian politician moved a resolution in the Imperial Legislative Council for total abolition of the system, concluding that ”it was based on fraud and maintained by force, that safeguards were illusory, that it was accompanied by frightful immorality and it was degrading to people of India‘.67 In 1913 Dr Manilal, a prominent social reformer in Fiji from India called for abolition of indenture in Fiji through an article he sent to India. In the same year an article written by Swami Manoharnand under the heading —The Cry of an Indian Woman‘, which related the story of a girmitiya woman called Kunti, was widely printed in India. The combined effect of this was a call by the Government of India to the Fiji Government for an investigation of allegations of maltreatment of girmitiyas in Fiji. In 1913 a Commission from India was sent to Fiji to investigate abuses of the indenture system and the girmitiyas. In the same year, Thomas Hughes, the roving CSR Company official, visited Mauritius and ”formed the opinion that if Indian immigration were stopped in Fiji, as it was stopped there, a rapid increase in wages would follow and the sugar industry could not be sustained.‘68 The Indian Commission, (James McNeil and Chiman Lal), sent to Fiji also met with CSR officials (Knox and Hughes) who objected to certain changes in the report written by them because they feared that ”…if these changes were made recruiting would be impossible…‘ Gillion believed that: ”[t]hey formed the opinion that the situation was grave and dangerous, believing that the Government of India intended by these changes to stop emigration.69
66 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 171. 67 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 169. 68 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 171. 69 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 173.
34 In Fiji opposition to girmit came from yet another institution. Gillion states that ”[i]n January 1914 the Reverend Richard Piper, of the Methodist Mission in Fiji, published an article in the Calcutta Statesman which described the deficiencies of the indentured labour system and urged its abolition.70 In May 1914 Totaram Sanadhya, a Fiji girmitiya, arrived in India to campaign for abolition of girmit and was successful in getting many supporters across India. As agitation gained momentum in India, war came and the ships engaged in transporting girmitiyas were commandeered as troop ships. Because of this the Government of India suspended emigration but the CSR acted quickly to resume transportation. The CSR Company Manager Knox offered to find ships in London and when emigration did not resume by 1915, lobbied for protests to London ”that non- resumption of emigration would be a crushing blow to the Colony‘.71 The emigration was resumed and some improvements in treatment of the girmitiyas followed.
However the end of indenture was eminent when Mahatma Gandhi‘s trusted follower and social reformer, C.F. Andrews, took it upon himself to advocate for its abolition with greater zeal. He ”…concentrated in Fiji because the evils were greatest there….‘72 Accompanied by Reverend Pearson, he made an unofficial tour of Fiji, via Australia, where they had talks with CSR Company officers as well. Their report, which was considered ”the best account of conditions during the last years of indenture system…condemned the existing system with its inherent fraud in recruitment and moral evils‘.73 Faced with immense public opinion in India and a number of damning reports against the indenture system in Fiji, ”[on] 20th March 1916 Lord Hardinge was able to accept a motion in the Imperial Legislative Council urging the abolition of the system, and to announce that he had secured the promise of the British Government that would be effected in due course‘. In Fiji there were celebrations among the Indians and effigies labelled ”coolie‘ were burned.74
70 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 174. 71 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 75. 72 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 178. 73 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 181. 74 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 181.
35 The jubilation in India and Fiji on receiving this information was not shared by the Government of Fiji and the planters who ”accepted the news without despair‘ and the CSR Company ”now regarded the situation as grave but not desperate‘ because the Government of India had promised a new system of labour emigration to Fiji to replace girmit. The recruiting continued while Fiji waited for the new system but in 1916 only 1,600 girmitiyas were recruited while the requisition was for 3,000.75
Soon rumours started that the system would continue for another five years and ”…the planters were congratulating themselves on gaining a five years‘ reprieve‘.76 Agitation against the indenture started again in India, and now national figures such as Pandit Motilal Nehru and Mrs Sarojini Naidu became actively involved, while ”Andrews and Polak lectured throughout India, and the campaign enlisted wider public support than any other movement in modern Indian history, more even than the movement for independence… [and] Mahatma Gandhi decided that the issue was suitable for the first trial of Satyagraha (non-violent résistance) …he announced that the ships would be picketed unless the system was ended‘. 77
The new series of agitation resulted in the Government of India, as a special measure under the Defence of India Act, on 12th March 1917, preventing further recruiting in India for all colonies, ”but the British Government still intended to substitute for it some other type of immigration from India to the colonies‘. 78 However Knox was not convinced that another acceptable scheme would eventuate and ”now decided upon large-scale settlement of Indians as tenant farmers. This policy was forced upon them by labour shortage…‘ and ”…settlement of the Indians made the company independent of labour from India…‘79
75 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 182. 76 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 182. 77 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 182. 78 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 183. 79 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 183.
36 In 1917 C.F Andrews visited Fiji again and upon his return ”…he pressed for the early cancellation of existing indentures, for reforms in Fiji, and for rejection of proposals for further immigration‘.80 But the Government of India still resisted this. Further representations were made to the Government, including that by Miss Florence Graham of the London Missionary Society, Calcutta, who confirmed that ”the existence of grave moral evils, and recommended that all indentures should be cancelled as soon as possible‘.81 In 1918, the new Governor of Fiji, Sir Cecil Rodwell, accepted her conclusions and suggested that they should be cancelled on 1 January 1920, but the legislative Council, influenced by the planters, nominated 1 August 1920. Gillion believes that this was done as ”a compromise between their desire to conciliate India so as to obtain more labour in future, and their immediate need to retain their labourers as long as possible‘.82 Finally the planters realised that the indenture system would come to an end and unless more Indians were transported (under a new system), or those still in Fiji retained permanently, they would face an acute labour problem. The feeling of the planters was expressed in the Legislative Council by H.M. Hedstrom, an elected member:
We should try and get new population out here, in addition to this it is essential that we should do everything possible to retain East Indians already settled in the Colony…We want to make the conditions so good that there will be no desire on their part to return to their own country, and, by that means, retain people who are such big assets to the Colony…83
It appears that the main intention at that time was to keep as many girmitiyas in Fiji as possible. Fiji‘s sugar industry depended on their labour. The official ending of the girmit for the Indians on 1 January 1920 heralded more problems for the planters. Gillion, in his second book on Fiji Indians, writes:
On 1 January 1920 all remaining indenture was cancelled, and Fiji faced a potentially disastrous labour shortage. The prospects for renewal of
80 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 187. 81 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 187. 82 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 188. 83 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 189.
37 Indian immigration looked bleak in light of India‘s awakening of national pride and Fiji‘s poor reputation there.84
The majority of the remaining girmitiyas wanted to return to India. For three years since recruitment stopped in India, no girmitiyas could return to India because the Government of Fiji did not supply any ships for their repatriation. Gillion, writing on the collapse of the 1920 Indian strike, notes:
They had no one to turn to, no leaders of their own whom they could trust, and not even a government which would act as ”protector of the poor‘. There was a rush to leave Fiji as soon as possible.
Because of the shortage of shipping during the war efforts and immediately after it, the first repatriation steamer since 1916 did not leave Fiji until 1920. There would, therefore, have been a considerable number of potential repatriates even if there had not been a strike, but it is not possible to say how many. In the years before the war about 800 had returned each year. The government estimated that it would have been reasonable to expect 3200, or even 5000, in view of the general upheaval caused by the war.85
It is possible to visualize thousands of girmitiyas desperately wanting to return to their homes between 1916 and 1920 (when indenture was officially abolished). However the Fiji Government did not honour their side of the agreement for three long years. Those wanting to leave Fiji must have lived in utter desperation and confusion. Gillion informs us that by August 1920 11,369 had registered for repatriation. He further informs that:
The Rewa correspondence of the Fiji Times and Herald reported: ”The —Rot“ among the Indian population of the district can safely be said to have set in properly, and there is a veritable scramble to get away to India at any price. Many of the Indians sold their property and livestock at a
84 Gillion, 1972, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 17. 85 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 35.
38 fraction of its true value, often to Europeans. Some, on failing to sell their cattle, drove them into the bush.86
By 1921, the stage was set for the final act of exiling the majority of girmitiyas in Fiji. According to 1921 census, there were 60,634 Indians in Fiji, out of which 32,224 were born in India and 28,810 were born in Fiji. By 1916, when recruitment in India had stopped, 15,448 girmitiyas had returned and with 4,741 returning in 1920, the total had jumped to 20,229. A few more girmitiyas would manage to leave Fiji as the efforts to colonise them there continued. At the same time efforts to transport more Indians to Fiji continued till 1929. 87
Gillion informs us that after last of the girmitiyas were freed in 1920, nearly 12,000 had registered to leave Fiji within the year, and ”the planters were still hoping for 5000 immigrants a year‘ to be recruited in India and transported to Fiji when India resumed emigration of her people to Fiji.88 In 1920 only 4,741 Indians were provided ships to return to India; Fiji government was prepared to provide ships only once in three years, ”…arguing that the colony could not afford to charter more ships…89 On the other hand, the Government of Fiji and the planters, especially the CSR Company, were desperately trying to get emigration from India started again. An unofficial mission visited India in December 1919 to negotiate a suitable scheme but the CSR Company sent its roving official Thomas Hughes with a separate scheme. The mission also met with Mahatma Gandhi but learnt that he was strongly against the indenture system and was not willing to assist in its continuation. The Indian Government was also not supportive, despite the mission making several concessions. It promised to put aside considerable sum of money to purchase Fijian land for settlement of Indians ”…as the Government of Fiji is anxious not merely to introduce labourers who will remain for a comparatively short period, but to secure further permanent population, which was one of the greatest needs of the colony.90 In light of this and some further assurances by the commission, the Government of India
86 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 5. 87 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 217. 88 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 17. 89 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 37. 90 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 43.
39 promised to a deputation to Fiji, and provided the report was favourable, to restart emigration.
However, all the work of the commission was undone by the 1920 strike; the brutalities suffered by the Indians and the news of deportation of Dr Manilal had reached India and made Gandhi angry. He advised the Indians in Fiji to return to India and ”urged the Government of India to have them repatriated and an inquiry made into the banishment of the leaders.‘91 Anxious about the demands from the Indian people for the proposed deputation to Fiji to inquire into the strike of 1920, the Government of India decided to delay sending the deputation to Fiji, because it was afraid that the deputation would recommend rejection of any emigration scheme. The news of delay in sending the deputation was not received well in Fiji and Governor Rodwell complained to the India Office in London. In the meantime the Viceroy of India demanded to know ”how many Indians in Fiji wanted to return to India and what arrangements had been made to supply them with passages‘. He was not happy to learn that only half of those registered for repatriation would return to India and offered to assist in their repatriation. Blaming Gandhi for so many Indians registering for repatriation, the Government of Fiji expressed regrets ”…that the repatriates who wished to return to Fiji had not been allowed to do so…‘92
Then an unexpected strange turn of events happened. The press in Fiji and India began to report that repatriates from Fiji were ”…destitute and dying in Calcutta and asking to be returned to Fiji and other colonies.‘93 The timing and reason for the sudden concern and reporting of conditions of returned girmitiyas, which hitherto did not concern the Government of Fiji and the CSR Company, became such big issue for them when thousands of Fiji girmitiyas were returning to India and many more thousands were eager to leave Fiji. It must be noted that new recruiting of Indians for Fiji was stopped in 1916, but that did not include the repatriated girmitiyas from being transported back to Fiji. The
91 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 43. 92 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 45. 93 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 62.
40 reason for this saga needs further analysis here because Gillion feels that it was designed to scare girmitiyas in Fiji from returning to India. He states:
The Fiji Government and planters had only one interest in the problem of the unhappy repatriates who had voluntarily chosen to leave Fiji at government expense. Fiji needed labour and many of these repatriates were able bodies. …. The Fiji Government and planters hoped that the accounts of the suffering of repatriates, published in the Fiji press and widely circulated in the colony, would induce others who intended to return to have second thoughts and silence those who were denigrating Fiji in comparison to India.94
Gillion also notes that ”…it would appear, although no firm evidence is available, in selecting repatriates in 1920 and 1921 the immigration Department in Suva gave preference to those who said they wanted to return to Fiji‘.95 He also notes that C.F. Andrews, who was working in Calcutta at that time ”… learnt that the local agent of the CSR Company, which was, he believed, the virtual ruler of Fiji ... was charting a second ship and had offered a donation to the Emigrants Services Committee‘.96 Gillion does not name this CSR Company officer but notes that the roving ambassador of the CSR Company Thomas Hughes was in Madras in 1922 in an effort to revive immigration from India and where he ”…again suggested that the Indian politicians be financially bribed to agree to renewal of emigration to Fiji…‘97 It is reasonable to conclude that this saga of desperate repatriated girmitiyas lining up to return to Fiji was orchestrated by the Government of Fiji and the CSR Company to ensure continued supply of labour on sugar plantations in Fiji. This saga proved to be an embarrassment for the Government of India. However when in August 1920 the Government of Fiji offered to pay for return of some of these repatriated girmitiyas, the Government of India refused. Additional pressure was put on the Government of India and it relented and several girmitiyas were transported back to Fiji.
94 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 63. 95 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 64. 96 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 65. 97 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 91.
41 Gillion notes that from April to October 1921, about 6500 repatriates arrived in Calcutta. He states
At that time, Fiji took the opportunity to try to limit the number of future repatriates from Fiji to 800 per annum and to insist on their being guaranteed subsistence in India before they were allowed to leave Fiji, but the Colonial Office was cool towards this attempt of the colony to evade its obligation, and, in any case, the Government of India refused to agree on the grounds that it might be challenged as a breach of the agreement under which the emigrants went to Fiji.98
The above information shows that in its desperation to stop the girmitiyas leaving Fiji, the Government of Fiji was prepared to breach its legal obligation. Several hundred more repatriated girmitiyas (from the 6,500 repatriated in 1921) joined those wishing to return to Fiji and the Government of India allowed 887 to return in October 1921. The press, Europeans and the Government of Fiji made capital out of the saga in Calcutta and used it to ”warn people of what lay ahead of them if they were so foolish as to return to India‘.99 The girmitiyas in Fiji gave mixed reaction to these reports and stories from the returned repatriates. Some ”put off their proposed return to India‘ but ”many did not believe the stories and dismissed them as propaganda‘.100 Many girmitiyas were still desperate to leave Fiji and no further transportation of repatriated girmitiyas was allowed back to Fiji. The situation for the planters and the Government of Fiji was desperate. Gillion writes:
The year 1922 opened very unpropitiously. As Fell wrote to London: ”The immediate prospect of this Colony as regards the sugar industry could not be more gloomy.‘ The Vancouver-Fiji Sugar Company announced that it has decided to withdraw from Fiji altogether. And, more important, Knox laid it on the line: unless the British Government permitted more Indians to go to Fiji ”the ruin of the sugar industry in your Colony is imminent‘.101
98 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 64. 99 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 65. 100 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 65. 101 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 77.
42 The deputation, promised in 1920 to look into renewing emigration to Fiji, finally arrived in 1922 but ”… there was a widespread demand for repatriation even though the Indians had heard of the problems faced by the repatriates in India‘.102 The deputation report states ”…we impressed the Fiji Government that the Indians in Fiji should either be given an opportunity to earn a decent livelihood there, or provided at once with the free passages to India to which the great majority are legally entitled‘.103
It must be noted here that the new Ordinance regarding repatriation rights of the ”second generation emigrants‘ mentioned above, which came into effect in 1906, was beginning to have its effect in 1918. It means that from the year 1918 those girmitiyas who had arrived in and after 1906, did not return to India, and lost their rights of free passage. According to figures provided by Gillion, approximately 29,366 girmitiyas were transported to Fiji from 1906 onwards. With no ship being provided by the Government of Fiji from 1916 to 1920, several thousands of the second generation emigrants had lost their rights to free passage back to India forever and had little choice but to settle in Fiji. Gordon‘s vision to permanently settle most of the girmitiyas in Fiji began to be finally realised from 1918 onwards.
Before leaving Fiji, the deputation asked the Government of India ”to press for the repatriation to India of those Indians who were entitled to return passage and wished to go‘ and as a way to assist the thousands who had registered to leave Fiji ”the deputation also suggested that the Government of India advance money to defray the cost of repatriation.‘104 However the government of Fiji rejected any financial assistance from India and proposed that India be asked to pay for all repatriation in excess of the normal number.105 We already know that the Government of Fiji was prepared to repatriate 800 girmitiyas annually after 1921 (the number it repatriated annually until 1916, when repatriation was stopped until 1920. The Fiji Government‘s rejection of financial
102 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 83. 103 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 83. 104 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 83. 105 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 84.
43 assistance from the Indian Government to assist girmitiyas to return to India is another example of its attempt to keep them permanently in Fiji.
Both the colonial Government of Fiji and the Colonial Office in London were reluctant to allow the return of thousands of girmitiyas waiting in Fiji to be repatriated. Green, at Colonial Office in London, ”…observed that the illiterate Indians who went to Fiji knew nothing about the statute of limitations, average numbers returning per year and such matters‘.106 He may well be referring to the 1906 changes to repatriation Ordinance, which reduced the rights of girmitiyas to free passage back to India to only two years after completion of a ten-year girmit. The obligation to repatriate girmitiyas to India had added more pressure on Fiji as it ”faced with a financial crisis, depressed prices for its exports, the threat of the closure of the sugar industry, and the possibility that the colony would be called upon to meet its liability for the repatriation of tens of thousands of Indians‘.107
While the Government of Fiji was grappling with this problem, the CSR Company was engaged in saving its sugar industry in Fiji. We have already noted that its roving ambassador, Thomas Hughes, was in India trying to persuade repatriated girmitiyas to return to Fiji (donating money to charities to assist in this process), perhaps sending reports from Calcutta to Fiji‘s press to scare off intending repatriates, and bribing some Indian politicians to restart emigration to Fiji. On the other hand, its Manager, Mr Knox, spent three months in London, trying to persuade the government officials to instruct the Government of India to open up emigration to Fiji once again. He met up with Winston Churchill, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, and when Knox agreed to some concessions to girmitiyas, Churchill offered to assist. However, despite communications between London, India and Fiji for restarting emigration to Fiji, it did not eventuate ever again.108
106 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 84. 107 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 84. 108 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, pp. 86-101.
44 Back in Fiji the Government of Fiji tried even harder to renege on its obligation to repatriate the girmitiyas. Gillion writes:
Rodwell also proposed to defer the charting of the 1923 repatriation ship but this too was rejected. He argued that the Government of India was morally in the wrong in insisting on repatriation at the expense of Fiji when originally this had been part of a scheme of continuous immigration that has been stopped by India.109
The Government of Fiji appeared to be clutching at straws in its attempts to avoid its obligation to repatriate the girmitiyas. However after discussions with the Government of India, and the Colonies Committee in London in mid 1924, there was a dramatic change in the Colonial Office‘s view on further emigration of Indians to Fiji. Supporting Fiji‘s treatment of Indians thus far, it stated ”…that Fiji no longer expected or desired the reopening of emigration from India‘.110 This change in London and Fiji regarding further emigration to Fiji prevented India from forcing the Government of Fiji to repatriate the thousands of Indians wishing to return to India. Gillion did not write much after this event in 1924 about what happened to the thousands of girmitiyas who had registered to return to India.
In 1921, the Indian population in Fiji (girmitiyas plus Fiji born) was 60,634 and by 1936 it had become 97,651.111 By 1929, the majority of girmitiyas transported to Fiji after 1906 (total 29,366), who were not repatriated in 1920 and 1921), had lost their rights to free passage back to India forever and had little choice but to settle in Fiji. The government of Fiji was prepared to provide ships to repatriate only 800 girmitiyas per annum. We have seen above that it had tried to forsake that undertaking as well. After 1924 Fiji declared that it no longer needed more emigrants from India, the Government of India had lost power to force Fiji to repatriate the thousands of girmitiyas who had registered for repatriation. By 1921, a total of 26,729 girmitiyas had returned to India. Repatriation continued in small numbers up to 1957 and the total increased, according to Gillion, to
109 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 93. 110 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 93 111 Gillion, 1973, The Fiji Indian Challenge, p. 199
45 ”32,995 repatriates of whom about 24,000 were born in India, thus, about forty per cent of the immigrants had gone back to India, though some of these later returned to Fiji‘.112
It is disappointing that Gillion, after providing a good account of the issue of repatriation of girmitiyas and effort by the Government of Fiji and the CSR Company, with the support of the Colonial Office in London, to limit repatriation of the girmitiyas in Fiji up till 1924, suddenly departs from the issue after that. No other person has followed this issue either from 1924 until at least 1929 when the post-1906 girmitiyas (total 29,366) had lost their rights to free passage back to India permanently. From the information provided by Gillion, it is possible to conclude that the majority of the post-1906 girmitiyas were exiled permanently in Fiji after losing their rights of repatriation. Several thousand pre- 1906 girmitiyas continued to return to India annually, or when ever the Government of Fiji decided to provide ships, until 1957. The irony is that despite the early girmitiyas returning to India annually in large numbers since 1880s, and until 1924, thus threatening to destroy Fiji‘s sugar industry, within a short period after 1924, Fiji managed to permanently settle some 60% of the girmitiyas. We have noted that Fiji‘s first Governor and the initiator of the girmit system in Fiji, Sir Arthur Gordon, had envisaged settling some 75% of the girmitiyas way back in 1879. From 1924 onward Fiji had succeeded in permanently exiling sufficient number of girmitiyas for a viable sugar industry, which had propped the colony for many years to come. Little attention has been given by scholars to the girmitiyas who were desperate to return to India. Instead a myth was started that they chose to stay in Fiji, a myth that has permeated through all sections of Fiji society and still exists today. The damage that this myth has caused to the Indo-Fijian society and Fiji generally perhaps needs to be investigated and documented in another project.
The story of the exile of girmitiyas forms the main subject of this research and the film. The strategies used to tell this story in the film will be discussed in the two chapters below. The descendants of these exiled girmitiyas began to experience a second exile after the two coups that took place in Fiji in 1987. The film briefly explores the second exile
112 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants, p. 191
46 towards the end. However the concept of exile was very much a part of the life of the majority of the girmitiyas as they made home for themselves in Fiji. Post 1929 history of the girmitiyas and their descendants till the 2006 coup in Fiji is collectively well documented by Gillion (1962, 1977), Brij V. Lal (1983, 1986, 1992, 2000), Norton (1977) and Ali (1980, 2004). As the focus of the film is the exile of the girmitiyas, I will provide only a synopsis of the post 1929 events that have been covered by the film.
Exiled girmitiyas make a home in Fiji–Sub-plot of the film
Once thus exiled, these landless farmers and under-paid laborers were at the mercy of the Europeans, the Indian politicians in Fiji, and later the Fijian nationalists who began to assert themselves as the Indian population in Fiji began to grow.113 Under these circumstances Indians had to overcome three exceedingly difficult problems. Firstly, they had to continue to labour under very harsh conditions, similar to those during their period of indenture.114 Secondly, they had to re-establish a home for themselves away from their ancestral homes many thousands of miles away in India.115 Thirdly, they had to grapple with the fact that they would never return to their loved ones back in their villages. As if these conditions were not difficult enough, they had to face the brunt of racism from the Europeans and the indigenous Fijian leaders, which in many instances their own political elites did not deal with effectively.116 As the Indian population grew, politics in Fiji became more racial. Two political parties that were formed a few years before Fiji gained independence in 1970 were ethnically-based; the National Alliance Party was mainly supported by the indigenous Fijians and The National Federation Party was supported by Indians. Lal explains in detail how the racial politics developed in Fiji since the nineteen fifties till after the coups of 1987.117 The historical events traced above combined eventually and led to a military coup in 1987 and overthrow of an Indo-Fijian dominated government. The coup plotter Sitiveni Rabuka explained that ”In the simplest term, the
113 Brij Lal, 1992, Broken Waves A History of the Fiji Islands in the Twentieth Century, pp. 60-102, University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, Hawaii. 114 Lal, 2000, Chalo Jahaji, pp. 167-261. 115 Gillion, 1962, Fiji‘s Indian Migrants pp. 136-163. 116 Ahmed Ali, Fiji Indian Politics. In Vijay Mishra, (Ed), 1979, Ram‘s Banishment pp. 66- 87. 117 Lal, 1992, Broken Wave, pp. 165-315.
47 May 14 coup had been staged to restore control of the country to the indigenous Fijians‘.118 This demonstrated to the Indian community the overt nature of racism they faced in Fiji. Further proof of racism was demonstrated when the government of the first Indian Prime Minister was overthrown in 2000.119 The combined effect of these developments was that the indentured Indian community in Fiji, despite managing to build a home in Fiji, could never feel at home in their adopted country. Brij Lal has stated that ”The postcoup period has been a trying time for most Indo-Fijians, a time of humiliation, suffering, and torment when —everything‘s gone wrong in terms of their legitimate rights and expectations“.120 They were always regarded as second or third class citizens in Fiji and denied many constitutional and human rights, such as the right to buy land, call themselves Fijians or become head of the government.121 Lal provides an insight into the feelings of the Indian community when he states (regarding the 1990 constitution) that: The bulk of the Indo-Fijian community has rejected the new constitution. For them, it does not lay to rest the ghost of the girmit experience, but raises the specter of a new one, a life of subservience, lived as a vulagi ”foreigner‘ on the sufferance of Fijian people. While the original girmit lasted only five years, this one, they feel, is intended as a permanent arrangement.122
The upheavals caused by these events have directly caused thousands of Indian families to flee Fiji and settle in more democratic countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the USA. According to Lal, ”since the coups some thirty thousand have left for North America, Australia and New Zealand‘.123 Since then, the Indian population in Fiji has continued to decline dramatically. In an internet article in March 2010, Michael Field has written that data from 2009 census in Fiji
118 Eddie Dean and Stan Ritova, 1988, Rabuka: No Other Way The story of the Fijian coup, p. 14, Transworld Publishers (Aust) Pty Limited, NSW, Australia. 119 Lal, 1992, Broken Wave, pp. 214-304. 120 Lal, 1992, Broken Wave, p. 328. 121 The socio-political events in Fiji since 1929 have been adequately dealt with by Gillion (1973,) (till 1946), Brij Lal, Vijay Naidu, Ahmed Ali and others. 122 Lal, 2000, Chalo Jahaji, p. 328. 123 Lal, 1992, Broken Wave, p. 328.
48 ”…shows Indians now make up only 37.5 percent of the 837,000 people. In 1966 Indians made up 51 percent of the population…the dramatic change of the ethnic composition of the population gained momentum with Sitiveni Rabuka's 1987 coups and continued in the two further coups between 1996 and 2007. Indigenous Fijians made up 56.8 percent of the population…In the 11 years from 1996 to 2007 the Indian population fell by 25,020. Earlier data shows that since Rabuka's 1987 coups over 100,000 Indians had left Fiji‘s shores.124
The University of the South Pacific lecturer Dharma Chandra predicted that by 2030 Indians would make up only a quarter of Fiji's population.125 The coups and events following these coups have clearly signaled to the majority of the descendants of girmitiyas that Fiji is no longer their home.126
The exile of Lord Rama and survival of the girmitiyas
History does show that after 1929 the girmitiyas tried to make a home for themselves and their children after they found themselves exiled in Fiji. Gillion provides details of their struggles after 1929 in his second book.127 These were challenging times for them because they were not prepared for a permanent stay in Fiji and the film explores how they managed to survive in Fiji during this period. In the main the film explores the role the story of the exile of Lord Rama and the Epic Ramayana played in the survival of the girmitiyas.
The dominant Indian culture in Fiji at that time was from Northern India, which contributed to more than seventy percent of the total girmitiyas and more then fifty percent of those who eventually became exiled in Fiji. More than eighty five percent of
124 Michael Field, 2010,Fiji's Indian Population Collapsing, http://wwwfijicoup2006.blogspot.com/2010/03/fijis-indian-population-collapsing.html. 125 Fiji times Online website Saturday December 05, 2009. 126 There has been some change of attitude since the 2006 coup, and a number of Indians have gone back to serve in Fiji, which shows their attachment to the land of their birth. The writer of this dissertation himself worked in Fiji for a short term. 127 Gillion, 1973, Fiji Indian Challenge, pp. 102-198.
49 the girmitiyas were Hindus and central to the Hindus from the Northern India is the Holy Scripture of the Ramcharitramanas128 and the story of its central character Lord Rama. The story of Lord Rama begins and ends in the city of Ayodhya, which is situated in the centre of the area from where the majority of the north Indian girmitiyas were transported to Fiji. The origins and details of all the North Indian girmitiyas has been analysed by Brij Lal in his PhD thesis and presented in his first book on girmit.129
Significantly for the Fiji girmitiyas, Lord Rama was also exiled for fourteen years in the forests of South India, along with his brother Laxman and wife Sita. During the exile, the three endured many hardships, including the kidnapping of Sita and wars with the demon king Ravana of Sri Lanka. However, with the help of some trusted friends they managed to defeat Ravana and overcome all their obstacles and return to their home in Ayodhya. For some 25,000 Fiji girmitiyas, their story parallels that of their Lord in many ways, right up to their return to their homes in India after five or 10 years ”banwas‘ (exile in the forest). The story of Lord Rama played a significant role in keeping up the morale of the girmitiyas during the girmit period and for those who returned home; their exile in Fiji, the narak (the ”hell‘), was over. But for those who did not ever return to India, it became a life long banwas in the narak and the only solace for them was that their Lord had also endured fourteen years of banwas through no fault of his own. They were to die in Fiji attached to these thoughts. A contemporary volume by Vijay Mishra entitled Rama‘s Banishment, reinforces this idea.130
There was a brief period between 1950 and 1970 when the children of exiled girmitiyas may have thought Fiji was their home. But the coups of 1987 and the socio-political events that followed changed that. In 2000 Brij Lal wrote: It is often said that there is hardly an Indo-Fijian family in Fiji which does not have at least one member outside. In short, virtually anyone accepted outside will go, draining the country of skills it can ill-afford. ”I
128 The Ramcharitramanas written by Tulsi Das is also referred as the Ramayana in some parts of Fiji. 129 Brij V. Lal, 1983, Girmitiyas-The Origins of the Fiji Indians, ANU Printing Services, Canberra. 130 Mishra, 1979, Ram‘s Banishment, pp. 1-9 & 139-143.
50 would rather be a dog in America than an Indian in Fiji,‘ said a man whose house had been demolished and his possessions taken by Fijian mobs. He was not alone in holding that thought. Indo-Fijians will leave, in larger numbers than ever before.131
It appears that the descendants of the diasporic indentured Indian labourers of Fiji once again find themselves in exile in Fiji, desperately waiting to flee the country as fast as they can. Because of the length of the absence from the land of their girmitiya ancestors, not many of their descendants are looking at India to end their exile in Fiji. Although still harbouring deep emotional and cultural ties with the motherland India, they are settling in the western countries closer to Fiji, as if unwilling to sever all ties with their land of birth. Those settled in places like Sydney, for instance, are slowly building a home for themselves. Although they face many challenges during their settlement process here, the descendants of the Fiji girmitiyas may finally be free of the type of racism they encountered in the country of their birth. A visit to the city of Liverpool will show the making of a little India, which exhibits a combination of the culture and traditions of both Fiji and India against Australian background. Free of the cruelties of the girmit era and the racism of Fijian nationalists over the years, the Fiji Indians may finally be free to create a space for themselves which they can at last call a more permanent home.
Conclusion
Chapter One has provided the material on which the script of the film was written. It has discussed the subject of the core part of the film, that is, how approximately 60% of the girmitiyas were caught in the drama that ensured continued supply of girmit labour to Fiji. We have learnt that this happened in order to ensure continued viability of the CSR Company‘s sugar industry on which Fiji‘s economy was largely dependant. Then it briefly described how the girmitiyas made a home for themselves in Fiji using the story of the exile of Lord Rama as their survival tool. Just when the descendants of the girmitiyas were
131 Brij V. Lal, 2000, Fiji before the Storm, p. 180, Australian National University, Canberra.
51 beginning to regard Fiji as their home, the coups of 1987 acted as a catalyst for their new exile. The discussion in the next Chapter will be about the process of converting this information into a 90 minute documentary film.
52 CHAPTER 2-Search for a style for the film
This thesis and the film explore why the 35,000 Fiji girmitiyas, like their 25,000 compatriots, did not return to their homes in India contrary to the agreement (girmit). It is concluded in the first chapter that the majority of the Fiji girmitiyas, who remained in Fiji after the abolition of the girmit system in 1921, were prevented from returning to their homes in India, and thus they had to make a home for themselves and their children in Fiji. The second component of this DCA is production of a ninety-minute documentary film. This chapter presents a summary of literature on documentary filmmaking and the search for an appropriate style or mode for my film. Once this has been accomplished, the actual production of the film will be discussed in chapter three.
One of the challenges a filmmaker is faced with, after identifying the subject of a documentary film, is to find the appropriate form or the documentary mode for the film. This is needed in order to identify which documentary tools, from the overwhelming amount that is available today, the filmmaker can draw from to assist in the process of making his or her film. Accordingly, first I will identify the traditional documentary forms that this film (In Exile At Home) belongs among. I will discuss the problems associated with historical research I encountered and what tools the historical documentary literature provided in identification of the mode or the style for my documentary. I will then outline my search and identification of some of the non-traditional documentary forms that I have used in this film. In the main, the discussion in this chapter will be focused around third world, post-colonial and intercultural filmmaking.
At this stage it is important to note that the literature review and interviews with filmmakers and academics in Fiji revealed that only a handful of documentary films have been made in Fiji by people of Fijian origin. That includes those films made by Larry Thomas, Shaista Shameem, the Human Rights Commissions of Fiji and Fiji Government‘s Ministry of Information.132 During the research in Fiji in 2007, I have had access to
132 A list of films that have been produced in Fiji by people of Fijian origin complied by Fiji Institute of Technology for Fiji Film Festival 2009 is included in Appendix 1 at the end of
53 several of these films and discovered that none of them are concerned with girmit in Fiji. During my research I contacted Shaista Shameem, who informed me that as part of her PhD in 1987, she had made a film on Indian women during girmit. However, this film is not available in the public domain or in DVD or VHS formats. I have also been informed that no literature or academic paper presently exists on documentary films in Fiji. Therefore, documentary films and film literature on documentary films dealing with Fiji girmit are mainly non-existent.133 With no existing documentary film of Fiji‘s girmit history as a benchmark or guide, I searched the mainstream documentary literature to provide the mode or style of my film.
The literature review of documentary films coincided with my research on Fiji girmit. Both were substantial researches and my research on documentary helped me to refine my thoughts of how I would tackle production of my film. As I did for my research on girmit in Fiji I decided to start my research on documentary from its very beginning, dating back to its pioneering works the pioneering work of French Pierre Jules Cesar Jenssen, ”who wanted a record of Venus passing across the sun in 1874 in his revolver photographique-a cylinder-shaped camera in which a photographicœplate revolved.‘134
From a number of works that I read on documentary I found the work of Erick Barnouw (1993) Richard Meran Barsam, Nonfiction film: a critical history (1992) Alan Rosenthal (1988) very informative about the origins of documentary film making.
Barnouw outlined the earliest history of documentary film by outlining the pioneering works of Pierre Jules Cesar Jenssen Aedweard Muybridge, and Etienne Jules Marey. According to Barnouw, the achievements of these early experimenters were acknowledged ”…but it remained for professional inventors like Thomas Alva Edison and Louis Lumiere
this chapter. The list includes feature films, short feature films, documentaries and music videos produced by residents and former residents. 133 Sunil Bhan, a filmmaker of Fiji origin now living in the USA has produced Worriers of Toil but this film is due to be released in 2010. 134 Erik Barnouw, 1993, Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, Oxford University Press, introduction
54 to develop the experiments into a commercial reality and industry‘.135 Edison began the process by developing the kinescope peep show but Barnouw states that it was ”Lumiere who made the documentary film a reality on a world wide basis when he developed and launched a small size of camera in 1895 and his short film called Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory (La Sortie des Usiness).136 Barnouw states that this is how the global film making industry started. Lumiere developed more cameras and trained operators for filming in foreign locations. By the end of 1897 several hundred Lumiere operators were at work throughout the world and the Lumiere film collection reached more than 750 films. Within the first two decades of the pioneering work by Janssen on motion pictures, this art form had become global phenomena. In 1897 Lumiere withdrew from film making to concentrate on manufacture and distribution of cinematographes. More cinematographes by Lumiere meant film making was accessible to anyone who could afford to buy and operate the equipment. At the same time others such as Max and Emil Skladanowsky in Germany, Birt Acres and Robert William Paul in England and Thomas Armat and C. Francis Jenkins in the United States, were also developing cameras and projectors.
Soon new film enterprises sprang up throughout the world, including the USA, England, France, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Russia, India and Japan. Many started with nonfiction items-calling them documentaries, actualities, topicals, interest films, educationals, expedition films, travel films or after 1907, travelogues.137 It is obvious that the Lumiere Company played a huge role in the first phase of development of documentary and when Louis Lumiere died in 1898 documentary film making entered a period of decline and seemed headed for oblivion.138
It can be argued that rebirth of documentary occurred in 1922 with Nanook of the North, one of the greatest documentary films made by Robert J. Flaherty. It was well appreciated
135 Barnouw, 1993, Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, introduction 136 Barnouw, 1993, Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, introduction
137 Barnouw, 1993, Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, p. 19 138 Barnouw, 1993, Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, p. 21
55 by almost all critics; the film was a box-office success in the United States and a very substantial success abroad. 139
Flaherty went on to make more documentary films in the same genre, such as Moana (1926), and Tabu (1931), with German director Fred Murnau. Others too followed the success of Nanook of the North, such as Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack with their Grass (1925) and Chang (1927), French Leon Poirer with his The Black Cruise-La Croisiere Noire (1926) and the husband and wife team of Mr and Mrs Martin Johnson, with their Congorilla (1929).140
While Barnouw provided a comprehensive overview of the beginning of motion pictures and development of various forms of documentary films, it is Richard Meran Barsam who provides the definition of documentary films and critical analysis of the early documentary films and film makers.141 He clarified the relationship between documentary and non-fiction films and stated that ”…all documentaries are non-fiction films, but not all non-fiction films are documentaries.‘142
Barsham regarded John Grierson as perhaps the single most important theorist and influence on the development of documentary films. Barsam also acknowledges works of Pare Lorentz, Basil Wright American film maker Richard MacCann, Willard Van Dyke, American film maker and producer Philip Dunne and Andrew Sarris.143
What I found more useful in Barsam‘s work is the statement that a documentary film can be an instrument of social influence and change and the film maker can effectively blend entertainment and instruction. He asserts that the content of the film is more important, at first, than the style in which the content is communicated. He states that while
139 Barnouw, 1993, Documentary : A History of the Non-Fiction Film, p. 43 140 Barnouw, 1993, Documentary : A History of the Non-Fiction Film, p. 56 141 Richard Meran Barsam, 1992, Nonfiction film : a critical history, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, USA, p. 1 142 Barsam, 1992, Nonfiction film : a critical history, p. 1 143 Barsam, 1992, Nonfiction film: a critical history, p. 2
56 documentary may not place politics above aesthetics, he emphasizes that the film maker has specific goals to meet through his film.144
Barsam believed that John Grierson was truly the father of the documentary film who provided a sound and philosophical foundation for its development. I was excited when I read that Grierson was convinced that the documentary approach was basically propagandist rather than aesthetic, and, for him, the film medium happened to be the most convenient and most dramatic means to implement his ideas of community and world peace….for him, art and aesthetics were only a means to an end: national education‘.145 This was consistent with my aim in producing ”In Exile at Home‘.
Paul Rotha, another early documentary film producer and director, also spoke of documentary film as having message for the present community as well as the community of the future. He favored films which illuminate the past, explain the present and enrich the future. He saw the documentary film maker as both a sociologist and a cameraman. He saw the film maker in the role of educator, illuminator and a conciliator.
Barsam, Barnouw and others have gone on to describe in details the development of documentary film making through rest of the century and into the 21st century. Reading through the history and development of documentary film making I was consciously trying to place my own style of film making into one or the other existing styles. It became very clear to me very early that my style of film making was much closer to Grierson‘s style than Flaherty‘s. My three documentary films in the series Milaap: Discover Indian Roots plus Once were farmers are all Grierson style films.
I wanted my film In Exile at Home to be both educational and political and the above findings gave me great confidence to go ahead with my film. I was however acutely aware that all the historical films and filmmakers described by Barnouw, Barsam and others I studied, had substantial budgets to make their films and they mostly worked on subjects
144 Barsam, 1992, Nonfiction film: a critical history, p. 5 145 Barsam, 1992, Nonfiction film: a critical history, p. 8
57 uncomplicated by colonial interventions. On the other hand, as a post colonial descendant of the colonized people about whom I was making this film, and I had taken on a film project with no production budget. The project was further complicated by the fact that most of the information available on this subject was provided by colonial writers and little information was available from the girmitiyas themselves.
I looked at modern documentary and works of a few notable writers and filmmakers such as Michael Renov (2004), Ken Burn and Michael Moore for inspiration and style. However in order to address the issues I have mentioned above, I examined The Third World Cinema and Intercultural cinema more thoroughly. (See discussion below) But before I went on to do that I examined work of Rosenthal closely as well.
In Exile At Home is essentially an historical documentary, and more explicitly, an expository documentary, as defined by Bill Nichols.146 Therefore I will first look at these two forms, that is, the Historical and Expository forms of documentary filmmaking. Because this film seeks to investigate the colonial past of the indentured Indians in Fiji, I believe the conventional historical documentary research tools may not be adequate for the purpose of making this documentary film. I will undertake an examination of the literature on documentaries that deal with the colonial and post-colonial subjects, in particular the literature on post-colonial and intercultural cinemas, in order to determine to what extent they potentially contribute towards the present project.
It is important to understand the relationship between historical and expository films and how they relate to my film In Exile At Home. Bill Nichols organized documentary films according to some recurrent features or conventions. He states that:
In documentary films, four modes of representation stand out as the dominant organizational patterns around which most texts are structured: expository, observational, interactive and reflexive.147
146 Bill Nichols, 1994, Blurred boundaries: questions of meaning in contemporary culture, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, USA. 147 Bill Nichols, 1991, Representing reality: issues and concepts in documentary, p. 132, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, USA.
58 Nichols goes on to explain these modes of representation. Following on, according to his classification, historical documentary films fall into the expository mode. He states:
[…] expository documentary (Grierson and Flaherty, among others) arose from a dissatisfaction with the distracting, entertainment qualities of the fiction films. Voice-of-God commentary and poetic perspective sought to disclose information about the historical world and to see that world afresh, even if these views came to seem romantic or didactic.148
Knowing what the main elements of the expository mode are is useful here. Nichols states that in the expository mode the film speaks to the viewer directly, and documentary aids, such as titles or voices, are used to advance any arguments of the subject matter.149 He goes on to describe what constitutes the expository mode of documentary films and the significance of the voices used and the role of this type of film.150 In his later works, Blurred Boundaries (1994) and Introduction to Documentary, (2001) Nichols refines his definitions, adding more categories and replacing some of the earlier ones. But essentially for him, historical documentaries fall into the expository mode.
As In Exile At Home seeks to expose, from an historical perspective, the experiences of the girmitiyas of Fiji, this film clearly falls into the expository mode, as defined by Nichols. Therefore, this film uses some of the tools provided by this mode of documentary. For example, it uses voices of interviewees and a narrator to put forward and advance the arguments about the subject of this film.
There appears to be some disagreement about the role of documentary filmmakers in interpreting or reinterpreting history. For example, Alan Rosenthal states that many academic historians hold a belief that history should not be tampered with by filmmakers.151 The argument goes that the real historians are interested in accuracy, and
147 Nichols, 1991, Representing reality: issues and concepts in documentary, pp. 32-33. 148 Nichols, 1991 Representing reality: issues and concepts in documentary, pp. 34-37. 149 Bill Nichols, 1994, Blurred boundaries: Questions of meaning in contemporary culture, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, USA.
151 Alan Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary films and videos, p. 298, Southern Illinois University Press, USA
59 filmmakers in entertainment, and most historians would not agree with the views of history put forward by filmmakers. Rosenthal, however, argues that, as there are bad historians, so there are also bad filmmakers. And while filmmakers do wish to entertain, this aim is not incompatible with advancing historical veracities through their films. Not being an historian I do not see my film as an education tool on Fiji‘s girmit history. However I hope my target audience will learn certain aspects of Fiji girmit history as they watch the film.
What appears to be important here is that, in historical films, the accuracy of material included in the film is paramount.152 These include adequate coverage of the subject matter of the film, and the views expressed must be objective and not simply used to promote a particular viewpoint. All the events presented as facts must be historically accurate and any hypotheses or inferences should be justified if they are presented as depicting the truth. Rosenthal warns that a ”… filmmaker ignores historians at his or her peril‘.153 The inference here is that if the film does not project historical truth, the historians will certainly pick this up and the film will be exposed for any inaccuracies or distortions of history.
What is also inferred from the discussion above is that, for the filmmaker to be believed by the audience, the facts of the film have to be beyond doubt. Sheila Curran Bernard also alludes to this point when she states that:
[…] documentary filmmakers work with facts, not fiction; we are not free to invent plot points or character arcs and instead must find them in the raw material of real life. Our stories depend not on creative invention but on creative arrangement, and our storytelling must be done without sacrificing integrity. It‘s a tall order.154
Presenting facts in any film can be a daunting task. It is even more so in historical films, especially where sparse documentation is available on the subject matter. However the
152 Alan Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, pp. 298-299. 153 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 299. 154 Sheila Curran Bernard, 2004, Documentary storytelling for film and videomakers, p. 1, Focal Press, Burlington, MA, USA
60 lack of sufficient historical documentation does not mean that the filmmaker can take short cuts or even manipulate historical facts at any cost. These sorts of warnings by Bernard and Rosenthal are essential reminders to filmmakers who delve into historical material. This is equally true in the case of In Exile At Home because, due to the lack of historical material on this subject, several creative strategies are used to present historical facts. These include use of reenactments, poetry and songs. Much care is taken when this is done, in order to ensure that they capture the spirit of the historical truth. Rosenthal is perhaps aware of these types of limitations placed on historical filmmakers when he states: ”[the] best of historical films reveal issues in a new way, bringing enlightenment, and open new chapters in understanding.155
The above discussion highlights the problem of placing a documentary film in the mainstream. In other words, it highlights the problems associated with making an historical film based on historical research. This is because there is no fixed film formula that exists in which the historical research can be neatly slotted. Each historical research needs to find its own formula. The above discussion demonstrates how, by first knowing the nature of your own film, and then examining it against the resources provided in the documentary literature, one is able to find a mode/style, for his or her film. As demonstrated above, I have been able to do so for In Exile At Home as far as finding a place for it within the mainstream documentary films. However, I have also noted that, to a certain extent, because of the specific nature of this historical film, which challenges the colonial history of Fiji girmit system and the fates of girmitiyas, where there are many serious omissions, the mainstream or conventional documentary resources do not provide all the answers for making this film. In order to achieve, this I will have to look at the non- conventional or the fringe documentary forms, such as the Third World,156 postcolonial and intercultural cinemas. (Discussed below)
According to Nicola Marzano ”the idea of Third Cinema was raised in the 1960s as a set of radical manifestos and low-budget experimental movies by a group of Latin American
155 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 299. 156 Third World is used only because the term has been used to describe a category of films.
61 filmmakers, who defined a cinema in opposition to Hollywood and European models‘.157 Robert Stam defines Third World as ”the colonized, neo-colonized or decolonized nations and —minorities“ of the world‘.158 These are the countries and peoples who were subjected to Eurocentric colonialism, during which period their socio-political economies were mainly controlled by the colonial powers. Even after gaining independence from the colonial powers starting in the 1940s, many of these countries continued to experience economic and social controls from the former colonial masters, or some other nations from the west. The Third World films are about these countries and their peoples.
In relation to the mainstream cinema, the effort to categorize the vast number of films being produced at that time in Asia, Africa, and Latin America and the minority cinema in the First World, the emphasis on terminology —Third World“ was empowering. However there were differing views about the efforts of the Third World cinema. While some commentators/critics defined Third World cinema broadly as the collection of films produced by the filmmakers in the Third World countries, others preferred to endow it with ideological outlook, that is, ”as a body of films adhering to a certain political and aesthetic program, whether or not they are produced by Third World peoples themselves‘.159
As the Third World cinema developed, it began exploring a number of questions regarding production, finance, content, style and direction of Third World cinema. It appears that, as the first attempt to broadly categorize and define films of the Third World countries or the minority communities of the West, this was a suitable beginning. However, there were limitations to what it could achieve for its peoples. Stam puts another dimension to this when he says:
Unfortunately, perhaps because of an assumption that Third World intellectuals could only express —local“ concerns, or because their essays were so overtly political and programmatic, this body of work was rarely
157 Nicola Marzano, 2010, Third Cinema Today, http://www.offscreen.com/biblio/pages/essays/third_cinema_today/ 158 Robert Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, p. 99, Wiley-Blackwell publishers Inc. Oxford, England. 159 Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, p.100.
62 seen as forming part of the history of —universal“ œ read Eurocentric œ film theory.160
Because of these kinds of limitations, for a long time the various —Third World“ and —Third Cinemas“, which collectively formed the majority cinema in the world, ”…were largely ignored by standard film histories as well as by Eurocentric film theory‘.161 Later in the 1980s and 1990s, however, scholarly interest in Third World cinema reignited, perhaps because of the West finally began appreciating these films. This resulted in substantial number of texts in English, such as Teshome Gabriel‘s pioneering Third Cinema in the Third World: The Aesthetics of Liberation (1982), Roy Arme‘s Third World Filmmaking and the West (1987) Manthia Diwara‘s African Cinema (1992), and Frank Ukadike‘s Black African Cinema.162
Although the literature on Third World cinema is informative about the beginning of documentary filmmaking in non-European countries, or former colonized countries, and its progress till 1980s, it did not provide me with resources that I felt could assist my film. The Third World cinema‘s ideological premise and its concerns with the issues surrounding independence from the colonial powers, is not perhaps linked to the subject matter of my film. For me the search continued and I then explored the post-colonial cinema for these resources, a brief outline of which is presented below.
According to Stam, the aforementioned Third World theory has now become a part of the discourse of postcolonial theory.163 Postcolonial discourse theory is inclusive of several fields of study: history, cultural studies, economics, literature, cinema. This discourse explores, in the main, issues of the colonial historical documentation and postcolonial identity. The Postcolonial discourse theory is regarded by many as ”…theoretical work
160 Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, pp 101-2. 161 Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, p 281. 162 Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, p 281. 163 Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, p 282.
63 influenced by the post structuralism of Lacan, Foucault, and Derrida.164 According to Stam, Gauri Vishwanathan,165 defines postcolonial studies as the
study of the cultural interaction between colonizing powers and the society they colonized, and the traces that this interaction left on the literature, arts, and human sciences of both societies.166
The term postcolonial appears to have gained currency after the —Third World“ theory was rejected by the West. Most post-colonial theory relating to films appears to be on many ”hybrid‘ films that focus on Diasporas in the First World. Examples include: the Indian diaspora in Canada (Masala, 1991), and the US (Mississippi Masala, 1991); the Iranian diaspora in New York (The Mission 1985), The Suitors (1988); Ghanaians in Britain (Testament, 1988); Turks in Germany (Farewell to False Paradise, 1988); North Africans in France (Le The du harem d‘Archemede, Tea in the Harem, 1985); Chinese in the US (Full Moon over New York, 1990).
It was difficult for me to find post-colonial film discourse theory relating to films made in the former European colonies, especially in Fiji and other countries, such as Mauritius, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago and Surinam, where other indentured Indians were transported by the Europeans. By concentrating on the post-colonial diasporas, it appears that the post-colonial films omit, by choice or neglect, films on the issues of the pre- colonial and colonial period itself. Therefore, the practical resources that I needed for my project eluded me during the literature survey of the Postcolonial film discourse theory. This is not saying that these resources may not be in this theory. But if they are there, it proved very difficult for me to find them.
However Vijay Mishra‘s work on Bollywood films in Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire provides some valuable information on post-colonial cinema.167 Apart from connecting Bollywood films to Fiji and the important role they played in the lives of Fiji
164 Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, p. 292. 165 Bahri, Deepika, Mary Vasudeva (Ed.), 1996, Between the Lines: South Asians and Postcoloniality, p.137-8, Temple University Press, USA. 166 Stam, 2000, Film Theory-An Introduction, p. 292. 167 Vijay Mishra, 2001, Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire, Routledge, London.
64 Indians from their introduction in Fiji in early 1930s (when girmitiyas were still alive), Mishra‘s work demonstrated to me how Indian films played an important role in highlighting Indian social issues. His work made me think of incorporating a history of Indians in Fiji as captured in literary works of prominent Indo-Fijian writers such as Subramani, Satendra Nandan, Vijay Naidu and Brij Lal. In fact the dramatized scenes in my film were informed by their works.
I then examined works of non-postcolonial writers on postcolonial cinema. I find the work of Jeannie Martin illuminating in this regard. Confining her discussions to documentaries made by White Australians about post-colonial societies, she believes that any films made by white Australians about postcolonial societies, their accounts of postcolonial societies about which the films are made, will be done in a context of unequal power relations. She explains:
What this means is that, as a consequence of colonization and economic domination, the West continues to occupy a positional power in relation to post-colonial societies (even if this power be indirect or hidden). In brief, I propose that the horizon of all texts made from the West about post-colonial societies is bound by the legacy of the colonial relations.168
One interpretation of her argument is that because of this type of relationship between the West and the postcolonial subjects, stemming from the uneven power relationship between the West and the colonial subjects, the postcolonial white filmmakers may not be able to portray the truth about colonial and postcolonial subjects objectively. This is because white filmmakers are part of a society which:
pursues the production and reproduction of knowledge and preconceptions about post-colonial societies, knowledge born historically of the colonial relations. These knowledges and
168 Martin, Jeannie, 1991, —Big picture: documentary film-making in Australia“: Australian Documentary Conference Canberra, ACT), papers from the 2nd Australian Documentary Conference, 29 November-2 December, p. 118.
65 preconceptions constitute the ”taken for granted‘ world view of the West about ”other cultures.169
As my area of study is the colonial and Fiji society, I can find resonance in what Martin is saying. All the literature on Fiji‘s girmit, which were written during the girmit period, has been written by European writers, except the story of Totaram Sanadhya, which was written by Banarasidas Chaturvedi in India. An examination of what has been written by the European writers about the girmit during the colonial period in Fiji clearly reveals a one-sided colonial point of view, with the voices of the girmitiyas not well represented. However Gillion‘s work, to certain extent, represents a more balanced view.
It became apparent to me from the literature that I examined on the Third World and Post- colonial cinema that neither had sufficient resources that I was looking for. I needed tools that could assist in giving voice to the colonial history of Fiji, and find information from some of the archival material that exists today, such as poems and songs that has been handed down from the girmit period to today‘s generation. Although there are no films in existence, there are however local dramas that depict the Fiji Indian situation. Some of these dramas, such as the Ram Lila (story of Lord Rama) offer little windows to girmit lives in Fiji and assist in writing scripts for dramatic reenactments in the film medium. However they are not expected to give any insight into why the girmitiyas remained in Fiji.
Further literature survey led to me the ideas of Laura Marks (2000). Reading through her book, I soon discovered a base for my own particular form of documentary films, which is seeking to challenge the colonial history of the Indians in Fiji from the point of view of one of the descendants of these Indians. Perhaps the most difficult task in this respect was to invent the voice for the indentured Indian laborers, the girmitiyas, whose own voices has been lost in the passage of history, and are not available to our generation. The task here was to find the lost voices of the Fiji girmitiyas from among the remnants of information that still remains in Fiji from the girmit era, or from the records from the
169 Martin, 1991, Big picture, p. 118.
66 colonial or post-colonial era, the majority of which has been written by the White people. There is now an evolving imaginative literature that attempts to recapture lost voices. Marks talks about the fetishes, (as explained below), of the colonial or post-colonial people, which can provide valuable information about the society or community under scrutiny. Among many such tools for extracting information about the colonial and postcolonial societies, where information is very hard to come by, she states:
Fetishes as fossil, then, are two kinds of objects that condense cryptic histories within themselves and that gather their peculiar power by virtue of a prior contact with some originary object. Fetishes and fossils are nodes, or knots, in which historical, cultural, and spiritual forces gather with particular intensity.170
In the case of the Indian community of Fiji, I believe, their ”fetishes and fossils‘ would be the story of Lord Rama and his exile that existed in the memory of the labourers and offer much insight about the girmit people in Fiji. Hence the film explores the relationship between the story of Lord Rama and the survival of the girmitiyas.
Marks further states that intercultural films do not necessarily have to follow the representational rules that have been dominant in documentary for decades in the West.171 This thought opens up the possibilities of using other, non-conventional ways to represent the subject matter of my own film. According to Marks then, experimentation with new forms is not secondary but essential to the works of intercultural cinema. Because intercultural films are also based upon the initial historical research, the logical extension of Marks‘ argument is that some of the tools that have been used in conventional historical films can be suspended to allow for experimentation with new forms of social research into the colonial histories of peoples and countries.
The problem with the search for truth in historical films that involves a long passage of time is that one has to rely upon secondary sources for useful information. This is
170 Laura U. Marks, 2000, Skin of the film: Intercultural Cinema, Embodiment, and the Senses, p. 89, Duke University Press, London. 171 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 5.
67 especially true where the subjects of the research are no longer alive to tell their story, or they have not left any personal documentation that can be used by the researcher and the filmmaker. The additional problem that goes with research into colonial history, from the point of view of the colonized people, as I have briefly alluded to above, is that often the colonial history does not necessarily represent the truth of the colonized peoples‘ history. The intercultural cinema, I believe, provides filmmakers with tools to research into Fiji‘s colonial past, in which the truths about Fiji girmit and girmitiyas are located. Marks states that: ”Intercultural cinema moves through space, gathering up histories and memories that are lost or covered over in the movement of displacement, and producing new knowledges out of the condition of between cultures.‘172 In this case of In Exile At Home the film not only moves through space, but it also covers a period of some one hundred and twenty seven years of history. Some of the history of these people was passed down verbally in the form of poems and songs. Over the passage of time these poems and songs have lost some of their authenticity and urgency. Intercultural cinema allows filmmakers to collect, make sense of and give meanings to these histories and memories, and, in the process produce new knowledge out of them. Marks points out that another feature of intercultural cinema is that many important films focus on the traffic in people.
Some of these people may also be classified as —transnational objects,“ in that they are traded like commodities between nations as refugees, guest workers, —comfort women“ and other sex workers, or the vast undocumented workforce that underpins international commerce.173
Although she may have been speaking about the modern trafficking in people, her statement can be extrapolated to include trafficking of the indentured Indian labourers, which included the Fiji girmitiyas. It is significant to recapitulate here that 1.2 million indentured Indian workers were transported between 1838 and 1916, to many parts of the colonial world. This human trafficking is the second largest in the international labor trade, outnumbered only by the trafficking of African slaves, which preceded the Indian
172 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 78. 173 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 79.
68 —slavery“.174 The traffic in Fiji girmitiyas forms a small part of the overall traffic in Indian labor.
The following statement by Marks may appear to go against the basic tenet of documentary film. She states that ”Intercultural cinema is not sanguine about the truth of a historical event so much as making history reveal what it was not able to say‘.175 What I read in this remark by Marks is that, the lack of factual histories of colonized people, due to distortions, lack of written histories and verifiable oral histories, Intercultural cinema cannot reproduce the history of colonized people accurately but it can reveal what is not overtly stated. Therefore, pursuit of truth per se in these films is an option not worth chasing at the cost of telling the stories of the colonized people from their own perspective. What the film can do is to re-create the history from the material that exists. This the intercultural cinema does by closely examining the few facts, events and memories that still exist about the colonized people and by extrapolating their meanings it can reconstruct the historical events. The knowledge that comes out of these kinds of interrogations of the past, based on historical facts, can act as truth that was not recorded. In other words, it cannot say that certain events happened exactly the way it has been shown in the film, though what it can say is that in all probability, the events could have happened in the way it has been shown. To certain extent I have tried to achieve this in the dramatically reenacted scenes in the film, or where the interviewees provide informed opinions on certain issues concerning the girmitiya‘s experiences.
Marks goes on to say that film can recreate not the true historical events, but, by searching into the historical material in which it was found, at least provide another version of it.176 In so doing it reveals new history as it is being formed, with an alternative image and voice. For instance, where no image of the historical period is available, Marks suggests that investigation of archival material must be done in order to create images. Commenting upon the work of Alanis Obomsawin, Marks provides an example in which
174 The Indian indenture system has been described by many as a form of slavery, especially by Hugh Tinker in A New System of Slavery, Hansib Publishing, Caribbean, 1991. 175 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 27. 176 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 28.
69 oral histories and evocative drawings provide the Mohawk people a version of their history to counter the documented history of the European and Canadian colonizers.177 The alternative version may not be entirely true either (because passage of time may have obliterated or distorted a lot of information) but it still provides a version of history missing from the colonial history. Historical accuracy is a contested issue. There are as many histories as there are historians.
While discussing Radioactive Recollection Images as an Intercultural cinema tool, Marks states ”images that, while they do not correspond to any person‘s memory, cry out to tell the forgotten histories of which they are the index.‘178As noted above, in Fiji‘s girmit history not many such images exist today. The homes that the girmitiyas built for themselves in the image of their homes in India are non-existent. The image of coolie lines however, although not part of anyone‘s personal memory, is a potent structure that can evoke a plethora of emotions and reactions from the girmit community, if the images of coolie lines are successfully linked to the injustices of the girmit era. The life in coolie of Fiji line has come to symbolize perhaps the most degrading aspect of the girmit system, because this is one aspect of the system that was common to all the girmitiyas in the colonies.
Images of the original coolie lines would have given an additional depth to this film. Once again, due to the passage of time, none of the original coolie lines now exists. One of the challenges of this research was to find some images of the coolie lines that could be used in the film. With much persistence, I was able to discover one site on which once a coolie line of the girmit era existed. I was informed that the original coolie line was destroyed in a flood in 1931, and the line was rebuilt sometime later on the same ground and housed the girmitiyas who worked in the nearby Rarawai sugar mill. Therefore this coolie line is not the original one from the girmit era. This ground upon which a coolie line once stood, in Marks‘s analysis, is an historical fossil, because it has the ability to act as ”…the indexical trace of an object that once existed.179 This is perhaps the only such site that
177 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 34. 178 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 71. 179 Marks, 2000, Skin of the film, p. 84.
70 exists in Fiji. Coupled with a few pictures of coolie lines, it can act as a site of memory of the girmit era, against whose background the stories of girmit life and atrocities can be told. (I was later informed that original coolie lines still exist in Labasa but I did not have sufficient finance to travel to Labasa to film them).
Conclusion
This chapter has provided the background and found the mode/style for my film; at the same time it has provided me tools to represent Fiji‘s girmit history. The tools provided by Marks were helpful in thinking outside the established conventions and thus incorporating the poems, songs and actor as girmit coolies in the film. The task now is to consider how the resources identified above were used to convert the story of exile of the girmitiyas into a documentary film.
71 CHAPTER 3-The making of the film
The previous chapter outlined how I discovered the mode/style for my film and discussed some of the resources of the documentary film has that assisted in various stages of production of the In Exile At Home. The aim of this chapter is to explain how these resources were creatively used to make the film. I will however start this chapter with some theoretical issues concerning this film, such as its aim, intended audiences, the subject and so on.
The aim of the creative component of this project is to make a film that provides new information relating to the history and presence in Fiji of the some 60,500 girmitiyas brought there from 1879 to 1916, including the filmmaker‘s girmitiya ancestors. The main aim of the film is to show that some 60% of these girmitiyas were in fact actively prevented from returning to India which challenges the popular view prevalent in Fiji that they somehow ”chose to stay‘ in Fiji. The secondary aim is to show how they made a home for themselves once they were thus exiled and to what extent their religious and cultural values assisted them in this process. The theme of the exile of Lord Rama is explored as it has played a significant role as a mythological paradigm. The film is based on the research material discussed in Chapter One.
The primary audience for this film is the Indo-Fijian community living in Fiji and in the Diaspora. Triggered by the coups of 1987 and 2000, today approximately half a million descendants of the Fiji girmitiyas, like their ancestors during the girmit period, find themselves in exile either in Fiji itself, or in countries like Australia, New Zealand, the United States of America or Canada. The sudden change in the lives of the Indo-Fijian community has raised many questions, one of the central ones being their identity. Who are Indo-Fijians or Fiji-Indians? Where is their home? The aim of this film is to raise these questions amongst the present Indo-Fijian community. The intention here is to provide them historical information from a different perspective as a doubly displaced individual that may help them to negotiate communal and personal identities.
72 This film can assist in correcting historical misrepresentation of the Fiji girmitiyas, especially such views as they ”ran away from India‘ and that they ”chose to remain‘ in Fiji. These and other forms of misrepresentations and mis-information about Fiji girmit system and the girmitiyas themselves most likely had a negative impact upon the descendants in terms of low self-esteem and identity confusion. I hope that this film will help the present day descendants of the Fiji girmitiyas to re-examine their views on the girmit and girmitiyas. Furthermore it is hoped that the film will regenerate interest in that historical period and perhaps bring new perspectives on the subject and that eventually the Indo- Fijians will start appreciating the sacrifices of the Fiji girmitiyas who were made permanent exiles in Fiji in extremely harsh conditions noted by many Fiji historians. Their hard work and sacrifices despite their sufferings in exile, made sugarcane a viable economy for the CSR and the colonial government of Fiji. The film ought to increase appreciation of the contributions of the girmitiyas and create a positive view among the Indo-Fijians towards the girmit history of Fiji, and that it does not remain as a source of shame that needs to be erased from one‘s memory and from Fiji‘s Indo-Fijian history.
The secondary audience of this film is the indigenous Fijian community. It is a well documented fact that for decades politicians have been turning common Fijians against the Indian community by propagating the false view that the Indians ”came to Fiji to escape the poverty in India‘ and therefore they could be treated like second class citizens. They asserted that the Indians should be grateful to the Fijians for providing them land to live on and eek out their livelihood from it. Therefore the Indians in Fiji were in no position to make political claims in Fiji.180 This film attempts to shows that the popular history of Indians in Fiji is not entirely true, and that many aspects of it are false or misrepresentations. The reasons why and how the Indians were taken to Fiji, and the circumstance under which they had to remain in Fiji shown in the film, will put a different perspective on the Indian presence in Fiji. I hope that this version of Indo-Fijian history will help towards forging a better relationship between the two main ethnic groups in Fiji.
180 Norton, 1977, Race and Politics, pp. 27-41.
73 The third audience consists of some ten million descendants of the indentured Indians from the other indenture colonies that now live in the Indian Diaspora.181 I am hoping that this film will start reassessment of the indenture system and the indentured Indians in these countries, especially why and how the indentured Indians ended up staying permanently in these colonies.
I also wish to reach out to Indians living in India and its Diaspora through internet, DVDs and screening the film on TV channels in India. The indentured Indians were taken to Fiji, and the rest of the indenture colonies, from most of the larger states of India. For over a century and a half, a lot of mis-information has been given to people of India about the indentured Indians and about why they had left India. Because of this mis-information the majority of these Indians believe that only low caste or undesirable Indians ”fled‘ India to these colonies.182 One consequence of this mis-information is that the majority of the Indians have a low perception of the indentured Indians and the descendants of these indentured Indians. In my role as a print and TV journalist, I have discovered that in Australia, this type of misinformed perception has contributed to a gulf between significant number of India Indians and Indo-Fijians. I hope that this film will lead to a better understanding among the Indians as to why the indentured Indians left India and why they did not return. I hope this will generate among them some understanding and sympathy for the indentured Indians and their descendants, and will eventually lead to a better relationship between the two communities.
Having identified the audiences for the film, I will now turn my attention towards the style, structure and other creative choices made in production of the film. It is generally accepted that to produce a good film it is important to get the basics of documentary filmmaking right. Otherwise there is always the danger that the film may lose its focus, especially in the case of an historical film that needs to cover material spread over a long
181 This figure has been arrived at by adding up the Indian population of the countries where the girmitiyas were transported during the indenture period. Those Indians who have migrated to the West in the post-colonial period will increase this figure. Some sources have stated the total to be 12 million. 182 This information is readily available on the internet and books published on the indenture system in each of the indenture countries.
74 period of time. Questioning why some films turn out to be memorable and some not, despite starting out with same basic technical equipment, Chapman suggest that this may depend upon ”how documentary filmmakers undertake and execute their projects in terms of the diverse challenges that presents themselves‘.183
Chapman believes that the starting point for a documentary film is when an idea surfaces. This idea could be small or vague, lying dormant for some time. If this idea needs converting to a documentary film, it needs identification of intention and vision from an early stage. She states: ”The process of adaptation and translation of an idea into the documentary medium is intrinsically linked to an understanding of what can and what cannot be successfully achieved‘.184 This illustrates that a good understanding of what is involved in making a good documentary is essential. From this point, a filmmaker is confronted with a number of choices in relation to approach, style, and other creative and administrative choices in order to present facts as seen by the filmmaker. Chapman states: …there has been an artistic and editorial conflict between the communication of truth and the perceived reality. Documentary has always ranged from actuality (what is happening right now), where the outcome is still unknown, through to re-creations and re-enactments which require much preparation and attention to detail, as of course, other films and television programs do.185
Literature on the subject demonstrates that documentary filmmaking encompasses a wide variety of films and filmmaking techniques to present contents. Therefore it is essential that a new documentary idea needs to find and adhere to an identifiable mode or style that has its own voice, content and style to guide it through to successful completion. In order to achieve this, and to find a way forward, requires good knowledge of the nature of documentary filmmaking, sufficient to enable the filmmaker to make informed choices at various stages of filmmaking. Chapman speaks about five distinctive characteristics of
183 Jane Chapman, 2007, Documentary in practice: filmmakers and production choices, p. 23, Polity Press, Cambridge, UK. 184 Chapman, 2007, Documentary in practice, p. 1. 185 Chapman, 2007, Documentary in practice, p. 2.
75 documentary films: ”subjects, purpose (viewpoints or approach), forms, production methods and techniques and the sorts of experience that the audience is offered‘.186 These categories need further exploration here in order to see how In Exile At Home is informed by them.
For a good documentary, the subject needs to be specific and factual, usually about a matter that will have public interest, even if the film deals with the private life of individuals. The content of the documentary, such as places, people and events are all real, even if they happened many years ago. I believe that the subject of the documentary In Exile At Home is about an area of Fiji‘s history that has been subject to misrepresentation and misinterpretation for some one hundred and thirty years. This should be of immense interest to some half million descendants of the Fiji girmitiyas who presently live in the Indo-Fijian diaspora.
The purpose of the film is to make the audience aware of the subject, inform them of what had transpired during indenture and influence them to re-examine their views about this important period of Fiji‘s history that greatly impacts upon the descendants of the girmitiyas and on ethnic relations in Fiji. It is anticipated that this film will have positive influence upon those Indo-Fijians who are now searching for an identity, and assist those people who are seeking reparations.187
According to Chapman, the form of a film, which is determined by its subject, purpose and approach, reflects the truth that can have value as historical evidence and record.188 Unlike a maker of fictional films, the work of documentary filmmaker is confined to extracting and arranging from what already exists and not making up content. In a documentary, recreation of what has already been observed is acceptable, but not any creation totally out of imagination. In the making of In Exile At Home, this feature has come into prominence. That is, the recreation of documented historical facts, where care
186 Chapman, 2007, Documentary in practice, p. 3. 187 There is a debate on the issue of reparation to the Indo-Fijian community by the British Government and the CSR Company. Some of this debate appears on www.girmitunited.org website. 188 Chapman, 2007, Documentary in practice, p. 4.
76 has been taken to depict the history accurately and any dramatic recreation that has been employed, are done to portray the realities of that period.
Rosenthal states that after the filmmaker has decided upon the subject of the film, the film can either be presented in the essay or the narrative style. Essay style involves the evolution of a theme or an idea combined with commentary by a narrator, where as narrative style is more plot based. For him, the essay style appears to be good for shorter documentary films, ”as it is hard to maintain viewer interest for more that thirty minutes in this style‘.189 As In Exile At Home is a ninety minute film, the essay style was therefore ruled out. However the film, which explores the exile of Fiji girmitiyas and the parallel mythic story of the exile Lord Rama, both narrated by the exiled narrator, was intended to be a narrative from the outset. Rosenthal states that ”most films need a key, or handle, an angle from which to tell the story in the most interesting, riveting, and entertaining fashion‘.190 The key or the handle for In Exile At Home can be said to be the vision and style of the filmmaker and his own story of exile or expatriation and how he relates to the exile of the Fiji girmitiyas and the story of the exile of Lord Rama
Turning to Rosenthal again, he states that ”just as a good book and play needs a structure, so, too, does the documentary film. It should present an interesting, well-shaped story, with pacing and rhythm that lead to a satisfying resolution.191 Finding the right structure to In Exile At Home was a very difficult task. This historical film tells the story that spans nearly two hundred years. The story is located in India, Fiji and London. However, as outlined in Chapter Two, through the literature review process the style/mode of the film was identified first and then the structure of the film was developed.
Writing about the style of the film Rosenthal states: ”think of where you want to go and what you want to do, and then find the most appropriate style to reach the objective‘.192 He adds that some of the pitfalls to avoid are ”dull, boring, long-winded, tedious and dry
189 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 59 190 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 60. 191 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 63. 192 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 69.
77 documentaries that have become, unfortunately synonymous with documentary films‘.193 Rosenthal dismisses the view that many filmmakers hold that there is a standard pattern for documentaries. He asserts ”What should dominate your thinking about style (and many other things) is the knowledge that there is no prescribed, hallowed way of making documentaries‘.194 He believes that the style of the film should be given freedom. The view of Rosenthal regarding the style of documentary was helpful in the making of In Exile At home because it supports my own view that a film does not have to confine itself to any predetermined style, and freedom is allowed to the film to experiment. Chapman also believes that ”Every documentary is different because it is individually crafted‘.195 These views on documentary that allow for greater experimentation and creativity, without the danger of falling outside the mainstream documentary filmmaking, have been helpful in the style of my own film. They gave support to experimenting, bringing my imagination to the work and imposing my own personal vision on the film.
Rosenthal believes that the style that are used in most documentaries is: ”straightforward, realistic and prosaic, and misguided; the limits they impose are to be regretted because imagination can invigorate even the dullest subjects‘.196 According to this view, a filmmaker can choose from a great number of documentary resources, and if, for example, one wants to use dramatic or fantasy sequences, there are no reasons not to do so. In Exile At Home, while using some styles of the expository films, including interviews, archival material, on-screen narration, voiceovers and montages, I also use some experimental styles that are discussed below.
The task of the creative component is to make a convincing and truthful film that will appeal to the target audiences and elicit from them desired reactions. In order to do that, I have employed two main strategies of documentary filmmaking. Firstly, I have used the conventional resources that the historical expository filmmaking provides to make a film as mentioned in Chapter Two. This served as the guiding resource throughout the process.
193 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 69. 194 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 69. 195 Chapman, 2007, Documentary in practice, p. 3. 196 Rosenthal, 2002, Writing, directing, and producing documentary, p. 70.
78 Secondly, I have used the resources the intercultural film to retell Fiji girmit history and incorporate fragments of voices the girmitiyas in the film. Thus in Exile At Home is a combination of historical expository film and intercultural film.
Today, a substantial amount of written material is available for new and experienced documentary filmmakers to use as resource, either to launch into their first documentary film, or to improve upon their documentary filmmaking skills. Professional documentary film texts written by writers such as Alan Rosenthal (1990, 1992, 2002), Bill Nichols (1994), Erik Barnouw (1974, 1983, 1993), Michael Rabiger (2004), Stella Bruzzi (2000), Michael Renov (1993) Sheila Curran Bernard (2004), and many others provide extremely useful insights into what documentary films are, how to go about making a good documentary film, what are the good practices as well as the pitfalls that are to be avoided. The documentary literature provided plentiful information from general issues such as the role of the researchers, directors, cameraperson and editors, to issues such as conceptualizing, writing proposal, research, shaping the film, script writing and its role, budget, (pre-production), the shoot (production) and edit, writing the final narration and finishing the film, (post-production). These aspects of film production do not need further elaboration as they are followed in all film productions.
In the production of In Exile at Home one of the most important and challenging creative task was to provide voices to the girmitiyas of Fiji. As already noted the absence of living voices of the girmitiyas, and very limited number of texts written by girmitiyas themselves, made this task extremely difficult This was complicated further by the fact that their history, which was written during and after the colonial period, do not represent history from the girmitiyas‘ point of view. The history that does exist about them is often a misrepresentation of the actual experience of indenture and this misrepresentation has now deeply permeated Fiji‘s history. This film has relied much on K.L. Gillion‘s works but some doubt is expressed about his total commitment to telling the girmitiyas‘ story truthfully when one notes Doug Munro‘s comment that ”whereas Gillion, as Lal sees it, was concerned ”to maintain —balance“–so [that] everyone gets their fair share‘.197 From
197 Lal, 2000, Chalo Jahaji, p. 6.
79 this it appears that Gillion was perhaps more interested in keeping various parties happy than telling the truth. This fact provides another dimension to this task, as the film seeks to challenge this version of history, with a version that contains the girmitiyas voices or voices that approximate that of the girmitiyas.
The task therefore was to find an effective way to convey the new information to the audience. It was very tempting to re-enact the grand drama (that took place involving various parties in Fiji, India and London) that eventually led to the exile of the girmitiyas in Fiji. This would have required recreating scenes involving the key individuals such as the Governors in Fiji, the officials of the CSR Company, Mahatma Gandhi, C. F. Andrews, and other anti-indenture activists in India as well some key characters in India Office in London, such as Winston Churchill. However I realized the production cost of such a film would have been too great and rejected the idea. I then explored telling the reconstructed story of the Fiji girmitiyas in the form of on-screen narration by myself as the filmmaker. The idea was to tell the story of the exile of the girmitiyas and the role played by the story of the exile of Lord Rama in their survival in Fiji, as seen from the eyes of the exiled film- maker–a descendant of one of the exiled girmitiyas in Fiji. I, as the filmmaker, was to narrate the unfolding of the stories of exile from various locations in Fiji, India and London. The original script was written along this idea. However after the shoot in London, it was decided to exclude the story of exile of the filmmaker from the film and concentrate on the other two stories of exile. The footage obtained in London has now been used to make another documentary film Life in Exile (2009). In 2006, footage was obtained in India to include in the film. The footage was taken from all the major areas in India from where the majority of girmitiyas were recruited for Fiji. This included Western Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. Footage was also obtained of the ports of Calcutta (including the Garden Reach area where the girmitiyas were held before transportation) and Madras in the south, from where the girmitiyas were transported to Fiji. The script was re-written to accommodate the change and to incorporate the footage obtained in India. After further exploration of the documentary resources, a decision was made to use some dramatic re-enactments from the girmit era. The intention was to use re-enactments to provide some visual images of girmit activities
80 such as recruitment of girmitiyas in India, because visual images of these are non-existent today. The film script was re-written to accommodate these changes.
However, the above style was substantially changed during the final one-month long research and shoot in Fiji in July and August of 2007. This happened due to several circumstances coming together and I felt the change would be appropriate for the film. The first factor was that during my research in Fiji, I was able to identify and speak with a number of Indo-Fijian academics, scholars and writers, who agreed to appear in the film. In all I was able to get agreement from eleven such interviewees, including two people who were in Fiji temporarily from Australia, and several who had returned home to Fiji after living in overseas counties for many years. During the pre-shoot interviews, it soon became clear to me that all these interviewees generally agreed that the Fiji girmitiyas were indeed prevented from returning to their homes in India. They agreed that they were exiled in Fiji, thus supporting my thesis. At this stage I decided that I would use their interviews to tell the story of the film.
There are several reasons that I chose these interviews as part the main style of storytelling in the film. Firstly, between them, the interviewees have accumulated vast amount of information on Fiji girmitiyas. All of them are highly educated and together have written many books on this subject. Discipline-wise they come from various departments, such as History, Economics, Sociology, Literature, English language and Law. All of them hold very senior positions in their respective fields in Fiji and Australia. Their qualifications, expertise on Fiji girmit and position in Fiji make their contributions in the film very convincing. Secondly, all of these interviewees are either first or second generation descendants of Fiji girmitiyas. The first generation descendants had direct contact with their girmitiya parents and are in a position to directly relate to their plights. Thirdly, several of these interviewees have done substantial amount of scholarly work on this subject, especially Professor Brij V. Lal, who is generally regarded as the leading contemporary scholar on Fiji girmit. Because of the combination of these factors, the interviewees in my film were able to provide convincing voice to the girmitiyas‘ plight in Fiji. The extent of their knowledge of this subject is equally matched by the depth of their
81 feelings towards the girmitiyas. The great respect they have for the girmitiyas is matched by deep sadness and regret that they feel towards the plights of the girmitiyas. I have used these interviewees as the driving component of the film. The use of interviews and narration falls within the classical expository documentary style.
The second factor that impacted upon the final style of this film was the availability of several individuals in Fiji who agreed to act in the film. This meant that I could add several more dramatic re-enactments in the film. I was excited and felt it would add to the film‘s effectiveness. I felt that using mainly interviews in a feature length documentary, apart from being tedious for the audience, would end up being too information-driven. Therefore I decided to increase the number of dramatic re-enactments in order to counter these two issues. I was able to do this because the documentary norms that I discussed above allowed for re-enactments as well as experimentation. These re-enacted scenes were all based on historical research that is outlined in Chapter One. Therefore each of the scenes is based on historical facts, which is, as has been pointed out earlier, a crucial element of a documentary. I have added further authenticity to the re-enacted scenes by not using my voiceover to describe these scenes. Instead, I have used the voices of the interviewees as voice-overs to these scenes. I have included the voices of several different interviewees in different scenes. By doing that, I believe I have provided further force and greater authenticity to the re-enacted scenes.
There are additional reasons for using the re-enactments as style in this film. Because of lack of sufficient archival images of the girmit era, these scenes have been created in order to provide the viewer some visual insight into the girmit past. In order to give these scenes historical aura in the film they appear in black and white. These scenes explore the journey of two imaginary girmit couple called Ram and Sita. The exile of this couple has resonance with the mythic story of the exile of Ram and Sita from the Hindu epic Ramcharitramanas which has played such crucial role in the lives of the Fiji girmitiyas during their exile in Fiji. It is hoped that these scenes will reinforce the role of Ramcharitramanas in the lives of the girmitiyas while providing relief from the factual
82 information provided by the interviewees. The re-enactment strategy that I have employed is part of the innovative aspect of the film.
During the month-long field research and filming in Fiji I spent two weeks interviewing possible participants and auditioning and training actors for re-enacted scenes. I then re- wrote the film script to include these interviews and additional re-enactment scenes. In the remaining two weeks I filmed interviews of eleven participants and eight re-enacted scenes in various locations in the capital city of Suva and the cane belt areas in north western Fiji.
The research on documentary films and the exile of the girmitiyas outlined in Chapter One was very helpful in both the interviews process and re-enactments. All the questions were carefully designed to obtain the views of the interviewees on the issue without imposing on them the views of scholars such as Gillion. My intention was to obtain impartial views of the interviewees. After filming in Fiji, I returned to Australia and visited Canberra to film the interview with Brij V. Lal. I was apprehensive that he may contradict the thesis that the girmitiyas were exiled. However I was relieved when I realized that he supported the thesis as well. I was satisfied that my original thesis on the exile of the girmitiyas was supported by these respected academics. I was also glad that I was able to use footage of a coolie line, girmit songs and poems to compliment the interviews. Additionally I had footage of eight re-enactment scenes to provide dramatic element to the film. I now had sufficient footage and was eager to start post-production of the film.
After viewing and marking the footage, I wrote the final script (editing script). This script included the narrative part of the film. I wrote the narration script and filmed it. By now the outlook of the film had changed significantly in many ways from the original concept, but it still retained the stories of the exile of the girmitiyas and Lord Rama. My narration included some aspects of my own exile. Now the stories of exiles were mainly told by the interviewees, aided by songs, poems and re-enacted scenes. The role of the narrator was generally confined to connecting the episodes of this one hundred and fifty year drama.
83 The laborious process of editing and re-editing, laying music and titling was done and the 90 minutes film was completed in November 2007.
Conclusion
In this chapter, I have explained how the resources of documentary film was creatively used to best communicate to the target audience the information collected during the research period that lasted from the start of the candidature in 2005 till the production of the film started in early 2007. First, I have explained the aims and the audience of the film. I have then explained that this film has been based on some of the basic principles of documentary film-making. After that I have explained how and why I have used interviews as the dominant style in this film. Finally, I have explained why and how I experimented with re-enacted scenes, a song, three poems, some archival images, and images from India, to recapture the voice and spirit of the girmitiyas and to enhance the aesthetics of the film. The film has been completed, and according to the feedback from the audience, it has been well-appreciated.
84 Chapter 4 œ Conclusion
The three chapters above discussed the three main tasks of the candidature: explore the exile of Fiji girmitiyas, find resources to document the findings in form of a documentary film and then finally explain how the film was made with the help of these resources. After discovering the drama of exile of the girmitiyas, there was a great temptation to make a documentary discussing and showing the roles played by the key players in London, India, Australian and Fiji in this drama, perhaps calling the film The Girmit Conspiracy. However, I did not have sufficient resources to embark on such a large and ambitious project. I may have to make this film at a later date. For this candidature I have managed to make the film discussed in Chapter three.
In his MA thesis (2009), now published as a book, Anurag Subramani has persuasively called for an end to perceiving the History of the South Pacific using conventional History tools.
I call for an end to the narrow way of thinking that ”History‘ has imposed on historiography in the Pacific. I call for an end to the discursive prejudices of the historians who have written about the Pacific and Pacific peoples. I call for an end to the kind of History in which Pacific peoples are relegated to the margins. I call for an end to the kind of History that does not engage in any thought about what really the discipline is all about. I call for an end to the kind of History that is not self-reflexive. …. I call for an end to the History which aspires to report the ”the way it really happened‘, thus compromising style for content. I call for an end to the History that does not dare to innovate in terms of language and form. I call for the end of ”History‘ in the Pacific.198
198 Anurag Subramani, 2010, Towards a New Pacific Historiography: Re-imagining 'History' as a Literary Artefact, (p. 136), VDM Verlag Dr. Müller Aktiengesellschaft & Co. Saarbrücken, Germany
85 He has called for an alternative way of conceptualizing History of South Pacific, a way that, while incorporating the traditional methods, includes tools that literature provides, in order to deconstruct the colonial history of the South Pacific and lend voices to the peoples of the colonised and former colonised peoples of the region.
The time is right for a program of re-imaging of History, and I believe it should come from those who have empathy for literature in general and post-colonial literature in particular; post-colonial literature because it is a unique response–an engagement, not a reaction–by formerly colonised peoples to those master discourses such as English Literature and History. I believe we here in the Pacific need to re-invent the writing of history.199
In his thesis Anurag Subramani has made a persuasive case for re-imagining the colonial history of the peoples of South Pacific, including the girmit history of Fiji, using non- History tools, mainly from literature and not excluding cinema. I generally concur with him but remain disappointed that he has not investigated more on the creative medium of film amongst his new tools of deconstructing the Pacific history. This is perhaps understandable because film production remains at basic level in Fiji even though Vijay Mishra informs us that first film was introduced in Fiji way back in 1928 and by 1933 seven cinema halls existed in Fiji.200
Vijay Mishra, in Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire informs us that film production in India started only seven months after the first film was introduced in India in 1896.201 He further informs that films were introduced in Fiji from India in 1938.202 My research in Fiji has revealed that the first film in Fiji did not get produced until 1977.203 Thereafter Vishwa Naidu produced the first-ever fully locally produced film in 1995. Apart from a
199 Subramani, 2009, Towards a New Pacific Historiography, pp. 125-126. 200 Mishra, 2001, Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire, p. X1. 201 Mishra, 2001, Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire, Preface. 202 Mishra, 2001, Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire, Preface. 203 Jhumka, produced by Michael Chinappa, but the production team, including the Director of the film was hired from India.
86 handful of locally produced feature films, film production in Fiji has remained very low, even after the introduction of television in Fiji approximately ten years ago.204
Vijay Mishra acknowledges that films in India have played an important role in historical negotiations when he states: Himansu Rai‘s first important film Achhut Kanya (The untouchable girl, 1936) is, however, important for two other kinds of historical negotiations.‘ 205 He goes on to refer to how this and other social films produced in India by filmmakers such as Himansu Rai first and later Shyam Benegal addressed social and historical issues in India. How these films have been viewed in Fiji is beyond the scope of this study.
It is surprising that Fiji has not produced many films and, until In Exile at Home, not a single film was produced on history of girmitiyas in Fiji. Therefore this film, produced as the creative component of this DCA, is the first film produced in Fiji which deconstructs the girmit history and perhaps satisfies Anurag Subramani‘s call for re-imagining History of Fiji using creative tools.
As stated in the introduction, production of the film was the third main task successfully undertaken to complete this DCA. The first task involved was to research and deconstruct Fiji‘s girmit history in order to create a new body of knowledge relating to this history. The second was to research documentary film production resources and establish film style/mode for my film.
The new body of knowledge that I have created is exile of approximately 35,000 Indian citizens who were transported to Fiji during the period of girmit between 1879 and 1916. I believe that I have been able to demonstrate this convincingly both in my research and in my film. Both these tasks were very difficult to achieve because they involved historical investigations and reexamination of historical material where little documentation was left behind by the indentured Indian laborers themselves. On the other hand, making of a forty
204 My own research for this DCA, and as the Acting Head of Department of Film & TV at Fiji Institute of Technology (August 2009-Dec 2009). 205 Mishra, 2001, Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire, p 18.
87 five minute documentary drama film with scarce historical documentation and meager production budget proved to be a Herculean task that took tremendous self-motivation and determination to accomplish to a degree that justified at least one prestigious award so far for the film.206
The film In Exile at Home was first screened during Indian Diaspora Film Festival at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts in India in February 2008 where it was received very well. It was later screened during Girmit Divas 2008 at Casula Powerhouse in June 2008 to mark the 129th arrival day of indentured Indians in Fiji. An audience of some 300 people watched the film with pin-drop silence. It was screened again during Girmit Divas 2009 in Fiji on 14th and 15th May 2009. Approximately 250 people saw the film in Fiji. A five minute highlight of the film was put on You Tube in 2009. To date approximately 5,000 people have watched the preview of the film on there. The film was submitted for Bhavan Australia‘s Indian Cultural Awards in 2009. In November issue of its magazine Bhavan Australia announced In Exile at Home as the winner in the Best Documentary Film category.
I believe that the success of the film so far has been due to sound research material that formed the foundation of the script of the film. As has been noted above, most prominent writers and practitioners of documentary films agree that good research is a prerequisite to an effective documentary film.
I believe that In Exile at Home has a significant role in the further reexamination of history of Fiji. It will also encourage others to engage in creative review of Fiji‘s history, as suggested by Anurag Subramani. Personally I would like to take a closer look at the literary works of Fiji academics and writers such as Raymond Pillay, Satendra Nandan, Subramani, Vijay Naidu, Vijay Mishra, Brij Lal, Sudesh Mishra and Shaista Shameem with a view to making more films on literary subjects. I believe that these literary works of the first generation girmitiyas are invaluable girmit fossils that need further attention
206 In Exile at Home has been awarded the best documentary film in the Indian Cultural Award 2009 by Bhavan Australia.
88 separately by filmmakers and historians. I believe several films (documentaries and features), are awaiting filmmakers in these works. I am inspired by these works; for a filmmaker like me they offer social and historical experiences that I can recreate to present to the public through the medium of films. I hope In Exile at Home stimulates other filmmakers and aspiring filmmakers to reconstruct some of these literary works into films. In this I can define the future direction for my work, exemplified by my contribution towards publication of Shifting Locations: Indo-Fijian Story207 that was conceived and published during this candidature. This project was first conceived as a film project, but resulted in a book. However my literary contribution to this book, The Yellow Suitcase has now eventuated in my documentary film Life in Exile (2009).
207 Subramani, (Ed), 2009, Shifting Locations-Indo-Fijian Story, Casula Powerhouse, Sydney.
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95 Appendix 1
Filmography of Fiji This list of films produced by Fiji and former Fiji residents was compiled and collected for Fiji Film Festival by Department Film & TV of Fiji Institute of Technology and its staff. This collection is the largest of the kind in Fiji. However it may not contain all the films produced by Fiji and former Fiji residents as the Fijian Diaspora is very widely spread and it was not possible to locate all the film producers. The present list is a preliminary survey. The present list is a preliminary survey appended here to facilitate future research
Feature films Film Name Producer Country of production Kalank (1976) Michael Chinappa Fiji Qayamat ki zindagi (1995) Vishwa Naidu Fiji Kanoon Se Rishta (1996) Vishwa Naidu Fiji Rangeela Remix (1997) Vishwa Naidu Fiji Archanak (1998) Vishwa Naidu Australia Aurat khilona nahi (1998) Jeff Khan Fiji Vishwaas (1998) Satish Rai Australia Jhumka (1999) Michael Chinappa Australia Khayalaath(1999) Sheetal Kumar Australia Shikayat (1999) Dharmendra Singh Australia Flight from a paradise (2002) Satish Rai Australia The Land Has Eyes (2004) Vilsoni Hereniko Fiji Adhura Sapna (2007) Vimal Reddy Australia Progeny (2008) Sadrishan Velaidan Fiji Three funny Rewans (2007) Rusiate Lali Fiji Na dodonu ni tamata œ e sega ni ka vou Rusiate Lali Fiji (2008) Dreamland of the moonless (2008) Director-Ellen Umlauf Fiji Trouble in Paradyz (2008) Narayan Naidu Fiji Ek pal-the unforgettable moment (2009) Satish Rai Australia The axe massacre (2009) Vishwa Naidu Australia Ria… (2009) Satish Rai Australia Ghar Sansar (2009) Vimal Reddy Australia
Documentary Films & Music videos Compassionate exile (1999) Bob Madey & Larry Fiji Thomas
96 Milaap: Discover your Indian roots (2001) Satish Rai Australia A race for rights (2001) Larry Thomas Fiji Destination Australia (2003) Satish Rai Australia Tree of freedom: commonwealth vision award James Bhagwan Fiji 2003 Dream Indian golf holidays (2004) Satish Rai Australia Once were farmers (2004) Satish Rai Australia Milaap: a royal discovery (2004) Satish Rai Australia Bitter sweet hope (2005) Larry Thomas Fiji Fiji Human Rights Commission œ an outlook Reggie Dutt Fiji (2005) The dance of life: commonwealth vision award James Bhagwan Fiji (2005) The long road œ commonwealth vision award James Bhagwan Fiji finalist 2005 Vude vibes - Veisisivi vucu ni vanua 2005 Alipate Mateitoga & Fiji Soro Toutou Milaap: the land of south Indian girmitiyas Satish Rai Australia (2006) Determining rights (2006) Reggie Dutt Fiji Tui Ravai: in his own words (2006) Tui Ravai Fiji Rising sons of Fiji(2007) Stevie J. Heatly Fiji & great council of chiefs (2007) Ministry of Information: Fiji Sinking rights (2007) Reggie Dutt Fiji Fiji Resortaholic Island (2007) CRV Fiji LTD Fiji Documentary on copyright Issues (2007) Seru Serevi Fiji Tears of the land (2008) Freddy Kado Fiji Ratu Navula college cadet (2008) CRV Fiji LTD Fiji Mana seaside chapel (2008) CRV Fiji LTD Fiji Life in exile (2008) Satish Rai Australia Struggling for a better living: squatters in Fiji Larry Thomas Fiji (2007) Na Dodonu ni Tamata œ e sega ni ka vou Reggie Dutt & Laisiasa Fiji (2008) Rogoyawa
Kailash Mansarovar Trith Yatra (2008) Jagdish Lodhia Australia Hamare sapne (song clips-2008) Anil Mani Fiji Na Buto Leka (2008) Rusiate Lali Fiji TFL Kula film awards (2009) Fiji Audio Visual Fiji Commission In exile at Home (2009) Satish Rai Australia Worriers of Toil (2010) Sunil Bhan USA
97