Dear Editor,
I was an eleven-year old boy at the laying of the cornerstone in 1945 for the Lachmansingh Primary School on Canadian Presbyterian Mission land. The Rev. J.B. Cropper gave a speech and presided over the laying of the cornerstone. In that speech he willed the land over to the Lachmansingh family for the construction of the school building. The Lachmansingh family, mainly Dr. J.P. Lachmansingh, founder of the PNC political party, paid for the construction of the school. All of this is mentioned in my novel, Road to Belwasa, published by WestBow Press. I was a student at the school and was in the same class as the father of the present owner, Jamal Azeez. The Lachmansingh Primary School was located on that site for more than 50 years.
If the founder of the PNC party can lose land on which his family had built an educational institution to serve the local community of Bush Lot, the PNC party has a lot to answer for. Land set aside for a church and a school, now used for a butcher shop, with full support of the PNC, is a disgrace. If Mr. Azeez vacates the land, I promise to construct a public library to satisfy the needs of the community. He and the PNC can hold me to that. Won’t that be more worthwhile than the butcher shop? The school was built in honour of John Babu Lachmansingh, the first Christian of Bush Lot Village.
In my time, the majority of the villagers were Hindus. To buy beef from Mr. Rahim, grandfather of Mr. Jamal Azeez, present owner of the butcher shop, I had to surreptitiously purchase a cut of sirloin steak so as not to offend the Hindus. Beef was taboo for the villagers in those days. Now Mr. Azeez, ably supported by the PNC, has the audacity to construct a butcher shop on land which I and the rest of our family consider “sacred.” My brother Hector, in a previous letter to the Editor, has also expressed his dismay at the actions of Mr. Jamal Azeez and his PNC supporters. So I say to the leaders of the PNC, you are supporting an illegal squatter, who is slaughtering cows on “sacred” land. My uncle, whom I lived with for some time, was a staunch supporter of the PNC, which owes him much more than they do to Mr. Jamal Azeez.
Sincerely,
Reuben Lachmansingh
