SHAS­TRI BOODAN

The leader of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha (SDMS) wants in­de­pen­dence for To­ba­go. Speak­ing with the Sun­day Guardian, Sat Ma­haraj, sec­re­tary gen­er­al of the SDMS, said To­ba­go should fend for it­self and stop be­ing a drain on the trea­sury.

Ma­haraj said bil­lions of dol­lars were be­ing spent in To­ba­go to ben­e­fit a hand­ful of the na­tion­al pop­u­la­tion. Ma­haraj said he wants the Gov­ern­ment to stop sub­si­dis­ing the cost of the fast-fer­ry ser­vice and the air­bridge ser­vice to To­ba­go. He said mil­lions of dol­lars were be­ing spent to send tourists from Trinidad to To­ba­go. "Let every­one pay the full cost to trav­el," he stat­ed.

Ma­haraj said the Gov­ern­ment can­not con­tin­ue to help pay for joyrides be­tween the is­lands. Ma­haraj said he saw no rel­e­vance in main­tain­ing a uni­tary state of Trinidad and To­ba­go since the In­do-Trinida­di­an pop­u­la­tion, which makes up 42 per­cent of the na­tion­al pop­u­la­tion, did not feel wel­come in To­ba­go.

Ma­haraj claimed that Trinida­di­ans were gen­er­al­ly ill-treat­ed by To­bag­o­ni­ans when on busi­ness or va­ca­tion on the is­land. He said In­di­ans are now feel­ing alien­at­ed and are re­fus­ing to go to To­ba­go since the "Cal­cut­ta ship" com­ments by THA ex­ec­u­tive mem­ber Hilton Sandy.

The Ma­ha Sab­ha leader al­so claimed that To­bag­o­ni­ans had al­ways re­ject­ed In­di­ans and Hin­dus, in par­tic­u­lar. Cit­ing an ex­am­ple, he said the SDMS had pur­chased land in To­ba­go for the con­struc­tion of a tem­ple at Carn­bee over five years ago but the THA had re­fused to grant per­mis­sion for con­struc­tion even though there was a Chris­t­ian church in the area.

He said the THA al­so promised to grant a half acre of land at Sig­nal Hill to the var­i­ous In­di­an or­gan­i­sa­tions on the is­land. How­ev­er, the THA came up with an ex­cuse at the last minute and re­neged on its promise. "Cal­cut­ta ship can't land, but one from the Con­go can," Ma­haraj com­ment­ed.

Ma­haraj said un­til To­ba­go gets in­de­pen­dence he want­ed every­one to boy­cott To­ba­go. Ma­haraj said Trinida­di­ans could en­joy them­selves va­ca­tion­ing else­where. In the mean­time, he sus­pect­ed that the THA would move to patch things up and save face by giv­ing "cur­ry favour" to one of the three In­do-based or­gan­i­sa­tions on the is­land.