AN­GE­LO JE­DIDI­AH

Re­porter

an­ge­lo.je­didi­ah@guardian.co.tt

As the drums roll and the ef­fi­gy of Ra­van is set ablaze, com­mu­ni­ties come to­geth­er to wit­ness Ram­leela—a cul­tur­al spec­ta­cle and vivid re­minder that good still burns bright.

Hun­dreds gath­ered at the San­gre Grande Hin­du School last Sun­day, a year­ly rit­u­al in the com­mu­ni­ty and en­vi­rons, for the cli­max of their Ram­leela cel­e­bra­tions.

On what was the 35th an­niver­sary of the event, the San­gre Grande Ram­leela Com­mit­tee said it con­tin­ued to take pride in us­ing open-air the­atre to bring to life the epic tale of Ra­ma, the in­car­na­tion of Vish­nu, as he sets out to res­cue his wife, Si­ta, from Ra­vana, the evil king who kid­napped her from the for­est.

“It was brought across by our fore­fa­thers when they came here, 180 years ago. Af­ter the abo­li­tion of slav­ery, the In­di­ans were brought here to re­vive the sug­ar plan­ta­tions. But for peo­ple to sur­vive, their cul­ture, their tra­di­tions are very im­por­tant, and we were blessed to have that priv­i­lege, to pre­serve it,” Pun­dit Bhow­nath Ma­haraj, founder of the com­mit­tee, told Guardian Me­dia.

“Even the Prime Min­is­ter of In­dia was shocked to know that Ram­leela goes on to this lev­el in Trinidad.”

Many young peo­ple made up the near­ly 175-mem­ber cast, in­clud­ing chil­dren from non-Hin­du schools in the area, sym­bol­is­ing the play’s uni­ver­sal themes of loy­al­ty, courage, and the tri­umph of good over evil.

“I’ve been play­ing for about 13 years now. I’ve played a sol­dier, queens and now I’m play­ing god­dess Si­ta,” said Ele­na Jag­ger­nauth, a stu­dent of SWA­HA Hin­du Col­lege.

“It is a re­al­ly good ex­pe­ri­ence. The hard­est part though is like to­day, when we know it’s go­ing to end and we have to wait till next year to ex­pe­ri­ence it again,” said an­oth­er young per­former, An­isha Ma­haraj.

Ac­cord­ing to com­mit­tee PRO Wayne W Boodoo, putting on this an­nu­al event is no easy task, but the pride, amaze­ment, and lessons it brings are what dri­ve the com­mit­tee and com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers to lend their sup­port.

“We will al­ways wel­come ad­di­tion­al sup­port, be­cause with­out that sup­port to ex­e­cute Ram­leela for 11 nights, the pre­sen­ta­tion that we put for­ward, from the wa­ter to drink to the meals, the snacks that the kids re­ceive every night, the cos­tume, the dec­o­ra­tions, every sin­gle thing here … if you was to put a val­ue to it, it will amount to over $400,000,” Boodoo said.

As night fell, the crowd grew larg­er, the drums rolled loud­er, and the chants in­ten­si­fied, as the 70-foot-high ef­fi­gy was set ablaze and top­pled to the ground.

The faces of au­di­ence and cast alike re­mained il­lu­mi­nat­ed, their col­lec­tive glow a cel­e­bra­tion of light’s tri­umph over dark­ness.

“What we see in Ram­leela, keep on the path­way of God’s con­scious­ness. If you keep on the path­way of Ra­van, well, you see what hap­pened to him,” Pun­dit Ma­haraj said.

“The de­ci­sion is ours to make. No mat­ter what faith you be­long to, be ded­i­cat­ed, de­vot­ed and hold to the Lord in what as­pect you may see the Lord in and you could nev­er go wrong.”