Pundit accuses Trinidad PM of showing contempt to Hindus

(Trinidad Guardian) Pun­dit Satyanand Ma­haraj has tak­en Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley to task for fail­ing to at­tend the clos­ing night of Di­vali Na­gar.

The Prime Min­is­ter has been in To­ba­go since Thurs­day to cel­e­brate his 70th birth­day.

 
But his fail­ure to ap­pear at the Na­gar is not sit­ting well with some.

In a state­ment Pun­dit Ma­haraj said, “For yet an­oth­er year, Prime Min­is­ter Kei­th Row­ley has shown open con­tempt for Hin­dus and a lack of re­spect for the na­tion’s di­ver­si­ty. Row­ley again blanked the clos­ing night of Di­vali Na­gar, where he would have been the ho­n­oured chief guest, and, in­stead, high­tailed it to To­ba­go, where he is cel­e­brat­ing his birth­day in grand style.’”

He added that the prime min­is­ter, “has now set a pat­tern of dis­dain for the Hin­du com­mu­ni­ty of more than 300,000 devo­tees, dur­ing this sa­cred pe­ri­od of the year.

Di­vali is the most spe­cial re­li­gious ob­ser­vance in the Hin­du cal­en­dar, and al­so sym­bol­is­es the time­less tri­umph of good over evil and light over dark­ness.The solemn oc­ca­sion is cel­e­brat­ed in most mod­ern, de­mo­c­ra­t­ic coun­tries; Unit­ed States Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump lit a deya and par­tic­i­pat­ed in a holy func­tion at the White House, the seat of ex­ec­u­tive pow­er. In Trinidad and To­ba­go, where the com­mu­ni­ty is not on­ly large but al­so an in­trin­sic part of the na­tion­al fab­ric, the Row­ley Gov­ern­ment has re­peat­ed­ly dis­played de­ri­sion to Hin­dus.”

He added, “While Hin­dus are en­gag­ing in de­vout wor­ship, Row­ley and his po­lit­i­cal brigade are par­ty­ing in grand style in the sis­ter isle. How de­spi­ca­ble of the leader who was elect­ed to serve and rep­re­sent all of Trinidad and To­ba­go!”

But the Pun­dit is not on­ly up­set with the prime min­is­ter.

He al­so chid­ed state me­dia house for grant­i­ng “Row­ley an un­paid three and a half-hour pro­pa­gan­da broad­cast to ped­dle his par­ty line on the bud­get and to seek to un­der­mine the con­tri­bu­tion of the Op­po­si­tion Leader.”

TTT on Sat­ur­day evening broad­cast the clos­ing of Di­vali Na­gar, while last week Tues­day Dr Row­ley host­ed a Di­vali func­tion at the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­tre to mark the re­li­gious ob­ser­vance. He al­so sent out greet­ings and mes­sages to make the hol­i­day.

The prime min­is­ter’s trip to To­ba­go has been re­gard­ed as fes­tive one and sources said he was treat­ed to birth­day par­ties, met with vil­lagers in his home town of Ma­son Hall and was the cen­tre of at­ten­tion at a fundrais­ing event on Sat­ur­day evening.

An­oth­er birth­day bash was ex­pect­ed to be host­ed for the prime min­is­ter on Sun­day af­ter­noon. Sources in To­ba­go said the birth­day events were at­tend­ed by sev­er­al gov­ern­ment min­is­ters and PNM fi­nanciers and saw Dr Row­ley con­nect­ing with child­hood friends and well-wish­ers.