Richard Lord

Pres­i­dent of the Na­tion­al Coun­cil for In­di­an Cul­ture (NCIC) De­ok­i­nanan Shar­ma is ques­tion­ing the method of se­lec­tion of re­cip­i­ents for na­tion­al awards. This, as the NCIC's nom­i­nees for awards–for­mer gov­ern­ment min­is­ter Ka­malud­din Mo­hammed and Jus­tice of the Peace Ack­bar Khan–were re­ject­ed by the Na­tion­al Awards Com­mit­tee. Mo­hammed was one of two nom­i­nees for this coun­try's high­est na­tion­al award–the Or­der of T&T. When con­tact­ed for com­ment yes­ter­day, Shar­ma said he was "very dis­ap­point­ed that a man who has done so much for this coun­try has been re­ject­ed."

He said Mo­hammed served as a coun­cil­lor, a min­is­ter in sev­er­al PNM gov­ern­ments, "and was called as Mr Cari­com for his tremen­dous work with the re­gion­al body." He said Mo­hammed was al­so a pres­i­dent of the World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO) and served those coun­try ex­ceed­ing­ly well. Shar­ma said while no one ex­plained the rea­sons for re­ject­ing a nom­i­nee, "some­thing is very wrong about the na­tion­al awards." He said the process did not ap­pear to be trans­par­ent and ques­tioned whether there was "racial dis­crim­i­na­tion in the se­lec­tion of awardees." He said he did not know what a cit­i­zen had to do in this coun­try to be re­ward­ed with its high­est award.

In re­sponse to an­oth­er ques­tion, Shar­ma said over the years he not­ed the racial im­bal­ance in the list of awardees. Sec­re­tary gen­er­al of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha, Sat Ma­haraj said yes­ter­day that the awards could no longer be con­sid­ered to be na­tion­al, but in­stead it was the Patrick Man­ning's awards. He said the SDMS had de­cid­ed last year against any fur­ther par­tic­i­pa­tion in the awards. Ma­haraj said Mo­hammed de­served the coun­try's high­est award but should not feel too dis­ap­point­ed by the re­jec­tion of his nom­i­na­tion. Mo­hammed, when con­tact­ed, said he had no com­ment to make on the mat­ter. But a source said fam­i­ly mem­bers were very up­set over the re­jec­tion.