Living and working conditions of indian indentured labourers
Answers
Throughout the entire span of the Indian indenture system in Trinidad (1845-1917), the living conditions on any given estate were hardly agreeable; and many times extremely sub-human. On the estates, Indians were assigned barrack-type quarters; many times the same barracks used to house the formerly enslaved Africans. Each room of the barrack building measured 10 feet square and 8 to 10 feet high and the partitions between rooms did not reach the roof, so that there was a total lack of privacy. Ventilation was often inadequate. Each such room accommodated either a married couple and their children or two to four single adults. Cooking was usually done outside, on the steps.
Two persistent problems on the estates were sanitation and the provision of drinking water. Although some of the estates had sunk wells and water pumps, the facilities for storing rainwater on the estates were often inadequate. Even when there was adequate storage the water was still often polluted since both employer and labourers were careless about preserving the purity of the drinking water. The Indians themselves further exacerbated the situation by drinking water from the streams, ponds and canals. Until the twentieth century, stagnant drains and the absence of latrines created serious sanitation problems on most of the estates. Indians had to resort to using the fields. Thus, malaria, dysentery, cholera and such parasite related diseases as hookworm, ground itch and anaemia were rampant on almost all of the estates. Indians were also victims of occasional epidemics of yellow fever and smallpox. By law, each of the estates had to have a hospital to cater to the Indian indentured labourers which the District Medical Officers visited at fixed times. However, the condition of these hospitals fluctuated from good to deplorable. In the latter situation, the Indians had to stay in their barracks and were taken to hospital when the doctor visited. So acute was the Indian distaste for staying under such dilapidated conditions that a law had to be passed that imposed jail sentences on those who ran away from the hospital. Despite steady attempts at improving the health of the immigrants, investigations have revealed that on average, an indentured labourer in Trinidad was ill for up to four weeks per year. High infant mortality rate was a major source of concern throughout the period of indenture.