Paras Ra­moutar

With­out foun­da­tions like Mere Desh, de­serv­ing cit­i­zens would sure­ly be with­out the guid­ance need­ed to fos­ter a strong na­tion and uni­fied coun­try, ac­cord­ing to May­or of Ch­agua­nas, Coun­cil­lor Or­lan­do Nages­sar. Nages­sar told the open­ing cer­e­mo­ny of the 21st an­nu­al Mere Desh In­di­an Ar­rival Day cel­e­bra­tions on May 30, it was es­sen­tial that foun­da­tions like the Mere Desh be sup­port­ed in their com­mend­able works. He al­so laud­ed the ini­tia­tives of Ajeet Praim­s­ingh, project co-or­di­na­tor. "The Mere Desh in its 21 years, has ac­com­plished much in the way of na­tion-build­ing which is its main fo­cus. Mere Desh has en­sured that this wor­thy fo­cus by host­ing events which recog­nise the con­tri­bu­tions of our sons and daugh­ters to­wards In­di­an Cul­ture, the an­nu­al In­di­an Ar­rival Day, and the var­i­ous work­shops and ac­tiv­i­ties geared to­ward the ed­u­ca­tion of our na­tion," he said.

Nages­sar called for the in­tro­duc­tion of the pan­chay­at(com­mu­ni­ty lead­er­ship meet­ings) to give guid­ance to our young peo­ple, which, he said, could well pro­vide, for­mi­da­ble re­spons­es to our so­cial prob­lems.

"This has served In­dia ex­cel­lent, and we here must re­peat this ap­proach with all the ur­gency at our com­mand. "In­di­an Ar­rival Day was sig­nif­i­cant to all sec­tors of the na­tion­al cit­i­zen­ship to share and ex­change mem­o­ries of a shared his­to­ry," he said. "As we go forth to our re­spec­tive com­mu­ni­ties, we must re­mem­ber our shared his­to­ry and en­deav­our to con­tribute fur­ther to our na­tion's strength and progress, each of us, in our own spe­cial way.

"We must nev­er say that it is up to our broth­ers and sis­ters or the gov­ern­ment or oth­ers, but it is up to each and every one of us and the Mere Desh to of­fer a hand of friend­ship in en­sur­ing that na­tion-build­ing ex­er­cis­es and ef­fort con­tin­ue as it re­lates to in­dige­nous art form and In­di­an cul­ture," Nages­sar said, adding that the "tra­di­tions of Hin­duism and Is­lam and their cul­tur­al ac­tiv­i­ties even­tu­al­ly trans­formed T&T in­to a cos­mopoli­tan so­ci­ety." "The com­mem­o­ra­tion of In­di­an Ar­rival Day takes many forms in­clud­ing prayers, speech­es, songs, mu­sic, dances and plays."And the spir­it of the day is in­voked at sea­side with the re-en­act­ment of the land­ing of the first boat-load of 225 adults, from Ut­tar Pradesh and Bi­har. "They have be­come the pi­o­neers who gave birth to the East In­di­an Di­as­po­ra here.This his­toric day was pro­claimed a na­tion­al hol­i­day in 1995," said Nages­sar.