Shas­tri Boodan

Free­lance Con­trib­u­tor

For 36 years, the Ajeet Praim­s­ingh Mere Desh cel­e­bra­tions have served as a vi­brant plat­form for pre­serv­ing and pro­mot­ing In­di­an cul­ture in Trinidad and To­ba­go, while in­creas­ing­ly plac­ing em­pha­sis on en­sur­ing younger gen­er­a­tions em­brace tra­di­tion­al art forms.

Found­ed in 1990 by cul­tur­al pi­o­neer Ajeet Praim­s­ingh, the pro­gramme emerged from a de­sire to present In­di­an Ar­rival Day cel­e­bra­tions in a more up­lift­ing and em­pow­er­ing light.

Ac­cord­ing to his daugh­ter, Sav­it­ree Praim­s­ingh, her fa­ther be­lieved there was a void in how the oc­ca­sion was be­ing ob­served at the time.

“He felt there was a need to high­light cul­tur­al pride, artis­tic ex­pres­sion and the pos­i­tive con­tri­bu­tions of our peo­ple to so­ci­ety,” she ex­plained dur­ing an in­ter­view about the up­com­ing cel­e­bra­tions.

Praim­s­ingh said her fa­ther’s guid­ing mot­to for the event was, “If not us who… and if not now when,” a phrase that re­flect­ed his be­lief that cit­i­zens should ac­tive­ly con­tribute to na­tion-build­ing and ho­n­our the achieve­ments of In­do-Trin­bag­o­ni­ans.

Over the decades, Mere Desh has evolved in­to far more than a cul­tur­al show­case. The or­gan­i­sa­tion has ho­n­oured more than 250 un­sung he­roes for con­tri­bu­tions span­ning mu­sic, cul­ture, re­li­gion, tech­nol­o­gy and so­cial work. Along­side these recog­ni­tions, it has host­ed a range of ini­tia­tives in­clud­ing tas­sa and folk song com­pe­ti­tions, dance con­tests, work­shops in pot­tery and sewing, and mu­si­cal train­ing pro­grammes aimed at nur­tur­ing tal­ent and pre­serv­ing tra­di­tion.

Among Ajeet Praim­s­ingh’s most no­table achieve­ments was a 2003 ini­tia­tive that saw him lead a del­e­ga­tion of lo­cal mu­si­cians on a uni­ver­si­ty tour across 11 states in In­dia as part of a project ti­tled Re­mem­bered Rhythms, an ex­pe­ri­ence that fur­ther strength­ened cul­tur­al ex­change be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and In­dia.

This year’s edi­tion of Mere Desh will pay trib­ute to chut­ney icon Sam Boodram, wide­ly known as The Li­on of Cu­mu­to, with or­gan­is­ers hop­ing the cel­e­bra­tion will in­spire a new gen­er­a­tion of per­form­ers to ap­pre­ci­ate tra­di­tion­al chut­ney and clas­si­cal mu­sic.

“We be­lieve the fu­ture pi­o­neers of clas­si­cal and clas­si­cal chut­ney mu­sic need in­cen­tives and plat­forms to flour­ish,” Praim­s­ingh said. “Tra­di­tion­al chut­ney and clas­si­cal singing are among our old­est in­dige­nous art forms, and they still hold rel­e­vance to­day.”

The com­pe­ti­tion, geared to­wards par­tic­i­pants aged 20 and un­der, will take place on In­di­an Ar­rival Day, to­mor­row, at the Pas­sage to Asia Chan­de­lier Hall on St Yves Street, Ch­agua­nas.

Or­gan­is­ers have al­so re­vised the rules this year to al­low past win­ners to re-en­ter the com­pe­ti­tion, a move aimed at en­cour­ag­ing con­tin­ued artis­tic de­vel­op­ment.

Praim­s­ingh said the theme was de­lib­er­ate­ly cho­sen as part of a broad­er ef­fort to pre­serve tra­di­tion­al cul­tur­al ex­pres­sion.

“Sam Boodram has made a tremen­dous con­tri­bu­tion to the chut­ney land­scape lo­cal­ly and in­ter­na­tion­al­ly while still main­tain­ing the tra­di­tion­al el­e­ments of the genre,” she said.

“I think my dad would have loved this theme be­cause his projects al­ways cen­tred around pre­serv­ing in­dige­nous art forms.”

Con­tes­tants will be judged on pro­nun­ci­a­tion, ar­tic­u­la­tion, stage pre­sen­ta­tion and au­di­ence re­sponse, with or­gan­is­ers hop­ing the event con­tin­ues to cul­ti­vate con­fi­dence and cul­tur­al ap­pre­ci­a­tion among young par­tic­i­pants.

Praim­s­ingh re­flect­ed warm­ly on see­ing gen­er­a­tions of young per­form­ers grow through the pro­gramme.

“I call them the Mere Desh chil­dren be­cause I have seen them ma­ture in the arts,” she said, not­ing that judges have al­so ob­served ma­jor im­prove­ments in the qual­i­ty of per­for­mances over the years.

She cred­it­ed Hin­du schools and cul­tur­al pro­grammes such as Baal Vikaas, Ram­leela, Hin­di and mu­sic class­es for help­ing young peo­ple be­come more com­fort­able with cul­tur­al per­for­mance and stage pre­sen­ta­tion.

At the same time, she ac­knowl­edged that cul­tur­al or­gan­i­sa­tions con­tin­ue to face sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenges, par­tic­u­lar­ly in se­cur­ing fund­ing and com­pet­ing with the pull of mod­ern me­dia in­flu­ences.

“Our cul­tur­al in­ter­ests are al­ways chal­lenged by mass me­dia and pop­u­lar cul­ture,” she said. “If we had more re­sources, we would be able to do so much more for the youths.”

This year’s event will al­so ho­n­our sev­er­al cul­tur­al con­trib­u­tors, in­clud­ing drum­mer Jagdeo Dee­ber­am, mu­si­cians Pre­ma­tee Bheem, Chan­dra Kat­wa­roo, Sav­it­ri Be­har­ry, Lily John, Lil­ly Ram­cha­ran and Sav­it­ri Ram­per­sad, along with dancer Ra­jesh Seenath.

Fea­tured per­form­ers in­clude Princess Priya’s Dance Group, Kush­man­da Dance Fu­sion, Tara­ma­tee Ma­haraj, Cen­tral Young­sters Tas­sa Drum­mers and Pared­siya Dance Group.