– He organised the signing of a petition containing representations by more than 9000 labourers. He revealed the numerous ordeals inflicted upon them by sugar-estate owning planters and public officials
Slavery was abolished in 1834 but it stayed as « a new system of slavery » until the 1920s. Why? Under the cloak of indentured labour, Indians were lured and induced to travel to Mauritius, forced to work beyond contracted period under slavery conditions and were manipulated to get settled in Mauritius as a cheap, permanent workforce for the sugar industry.
Adolphe de Plevitz (1837-1893) stood up to expose the evils of the system, the oppression and tortures imposed by the Police, the Magistrate Courts, the Plantocracy and other Public Institutions.
Indian Immigrants
Not only were immigrants used as slaves in the workplace, but they were also humiliated as human beings, in their psyche, self-esteem and humanity. They were thus doubly ill-treated. Manilal Doctor had condemned the indenture system as iniquitous, unjust and immoral.
De Plevitz organised the signing of a petition containing representations by more than 9000 labourers. He revealed the numerous ordeals inflicted upon them by sugar-estate owning planters and public officials. His revolt extended to the gatherings, sugar estates, magistrate courts, and during the Royal Commission of Enquiry 1875 (Freres and Williamson Report).
Heart-breaking situations
In the estate of Mr Staub, despite successive 15-day imprisonments, labourers were persistently refused to return to work.
Yellama, wife of Coolen, sirdar, was beaten brutally when she was expecting a baby. The baby died at birth, followed by Yellamah herself.
The labourers suffered public humiliation: They were « tied up and beaten and … dragged to the overseer’s house » and « several persons had heard that he had been beaten ».
Immigrants lived in fear. They were « cowed by former punishments ». The law was not adequately protecting the Indian immigrants. 50 deaths in 7 years caused by beatings due to « ruptured spleens ».
Only one public holiday (New Year Day) given. Other holidays given were like sham, as often wages and rations were cut. Their Sunday holidays were « frequently » stolen from the immigrants, as they were called to work.
There has been « infliction of great injustice and hardship » for confusion on « offences of illegal absence, desertion and vagrancy ».
Hunting people like animals
‘Maroon hunt’ changed name only to ‘vagrant hunt’. Thus, slavery and its connected practices continued. Raids and hunts were not stopped under the New Labour Law. Hunts were still existent only few years before Immigrant Gopee landed in 1877.
Hunting of vagrants were done up to top of Le Pouce mountain, where today people go for walks.
Hunt of 8.5.1869: There was unwarranted arrest (and therefore release) of half of the supposed vagrants (causing ‘annoyance and irritation’), the other half being condemned.
The Magistrates
Many Magistrates were not working according to legally-prescribed rules that regulate court proceedings. This created a situation where there was « great diversity and irregularity of procedure in the different Districts », yet ill-supervised by the Procuror-General Dept.
The system of conspiracy of injustice operated in two forms;
(1)« serious and manifest defects in the laws »; and, (2) bad treatment of immigrants in the estates (opposite of « kind and just »)
The stringent enforcement of the law symbolised the same inhuman attitude as adopted for slaves.
The magistrates too were inefficient in making returns. Their work was « in most if not all cases – a mere delusion ».
The Police
Many Police Officers and Magistrates were outrageously reckless. They enforced the law in amateurish manner both in spirit and letter of the law. Immigrants were charged indiscriminately of vagrancy, without evidence. People were arrested arbitrarily and wrongly for supposedly not possessing passes: This was a great injustice. This system of coercion by the Police and the Magistrates was the biggest malady in the society.
The Protector of Immigrants
The Protector of Immigrants was working more like an agent than a protector, « the protective functions being considered to appertain to the Stipendiary Magistrate ».
The Protector was dependent on the instruction of the Governor before conducting visits in estates. The Commissioners found that this « system » brought the Governor personally into more direct collusion with individual interest than is at all desirable ».
Conclusion
Besides bearing severe slave-like hardship on sugarcane fields, camps and estates, injustices and oppression against Indian immigrants plagued the police stations, hospitals, prisons, vagrant depots, public offices, and magistrate courts.
The colonial administration was weak. It lacked the « energetic and earnest determination » to carry the law and regulations into effect.
Public institutions, then and now, are expected to be trustful, credible, efficient, well-governed, and staffed with people of integrity. Unless corrupt, unethical and exploitative tendencies and practices are stopped and re-balanced, public institutions can easily become crippled, besieged, state-captured, and prey to the ugly and hidden agenda of fascist plutocrats and oppressive and incompetent leaders.
It would be an act of ingratitude and recklessness for current and future generations not to be inspired and ignited by Adolphe de Plevitz, and to remain passive and lethargic against any form of injustices caused by public institutions.
* Author of ‘Going Nowhere? Lead Yourself’
References
1.Report of Royal Commission of Enquiry, 1875
2.Restless Energy – A Biography of Adolphe de Plevitz by Loretta de Plevitz, (MGI) 1987
3. A New System of Slavery – The Export of Indian Labour Overseas 1830-1920, Hugh Tinker (1974) Oxford University Press.
4. William Draper Bolton and Others, edited by Pahlad Ramsurrun. HISTORY OF MAURITIUS – THE BRITISH PERSPECTIVES.
5. V. Teeluck, Mauritius History From Beginnings to Modern Times, (MGI) 2009