Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior Re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is urg­ing cit­i­zens to em­brace care, un­der­stand­ing and tol­er­ance for one an­oth­er, as she calls for the spir­it of Di­vali to ex­tend be­yond the an­nu­al cel­e­bra­tion and strength­en na­tion­al uni­ty.

In her Di­vali mes­sage, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the fes­ti­val’s en­dur­ing mes­sage of the tri­umph of light over dark­ness, good over evil and knowl­edge over ig­no­rance must trans­late in­to mean­ing­ful im­prove­ments in peo­ple’s lives.

Draw­ing on the Holy Ra­mayana’s de­scrip­tion of Lord Ra­ma’s reign, she high­light­ed the words: “All peo­ple loved one an­oth­er.”

The Prime Min­is­ter said the pas­sage of­fered a pro­found mea­sure of so­ci­ety’s well-be­ing and re­flect­ed the deep­er promise of Di­vali.

She al­so paid trib­ute to the an­ces­tors who pre­served their faith and tra­di­tions through hard­ship, say­ing their re­silience helped shape Trinidad and To­ba­go’s gen­eros­i­ty and na­tion­al char­ac­ter.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the coun­try’s re­spon­si­bil­i­ty was to car­ry that lega­cy for­ward by en­sur­ing that love of coun­try trans­lat­ed in­to care for its cit­i­zens.

She point­ed to the need for greater op­por­tu­ni­ties for chil­dren, se­cu­ri­ty for fam­i­lies, dig­ni­ty for el­der­ly cit­i­zens and a voice for every com­mu­ni­ty.

“May our care, un­der­stand­ing, re­spect and tol­er­ance for one an­oth­er en­dure be­yond Di­vali, deep­en­ing our uni­ty and help­ing us to over­come dif­fi­cul­ties and build a more pros­per­ous na­tion to­geth­er,” she said.

The Prime Min­is­ter al­so in­voked the bless­ings of Ma­ta Lak­sh­mi, pray­ing for peace, abun­dance, health and har­mo­ny in house­holds across the coun­try.

She called on cit­i­zens to cher­ish their bless­ings and share them gen­er­ous­ly so that well-be­ing and hap­pi­ness could flour­ish through­out the na­tion.

Beck­les recog­nis­es 60th an­niver­sary of Di­vali

as pub­lic hol­i­day

Mean­while, Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les used her Di­vali mes­sage to high­light the sig­nif­i­cance of this year’s cel­e­bra­tion, mark­ing 60 years since Di­vali was de­clared a pub­lic hol­i­day in Trinidad and To­ba­go in 1966 un­der the lead­er­ship of the coun­try’s first prime min­is­ter, Dr Er­ic Williams.

Beck­les said the de­ci­sion rep­re­sent­ed more than recog­ni­tion of a re­li­gious ob­ser­vance, de­scrib­ing it as an af­fir­ma­tion of the Hin­du com­mu­ni­ty’s im­por­tant place in the na­tion’s de­vel­op­ment.

She said it al­so es­tab­lished a prin­ci­ple that the coun­try’s strength would be built on re­spect for the faiths, tra­di­tions and con­tri­bu­tions of all its peo­ple.

“Six­ty years on, that prin­ci­ple has lost none of its pow­er,” Beck­les stat­ed.

The Op­po­si­tion Leader said Trinidad and To­ba­go’s abil­i­ty to ho­n­our dif­fer­ent be­liefs, share in each oth­er’s cel­e­bra­tions and find com­mon ground re­mained among the coun­try’s great­est achieve­ments.

She called for re­newed com­mit­ment to a so­ci­ety where every faith is re­spect­ed, every cul­ture val­ued and every cit­i­zen feels a sense of be­long­ing.

Beck­les al­so ac­knowl­edged the chal­lenges con­fronting many house­holds, not­ing that fam­i­lies were mak­ing sac­ri­fices while in­di­vid­u­als faced un­cer­tain­ty about the fu­ture.

“To them, I say: you are not alone. No dark­ness is so deep that it can ex­tin­guish the pos­si­bil­i­ty of light,” she said.

She en­cour­aged cit­i­zens to make the fes­ti­val’s mes­sage prac­ti­cal by be­com­ing a source of sup­port and en­cour­age­ment to oth­ers.