As a small child, his family left Kashmir and ended up in Calcutta where in 1852 they signed up as indentured labourers bound for the sugarcane fields of Trinidad and Tobago.

He purchased a donkey cart and made a living hauling sugarcane to the factory at Usine Sainte Madeline, then the second largest sugar refinery in the world.

After a few years of this trade, he sold his cart and established a shop in Danglade Village on the road to San Fernando (now part of the Petrotrin oil refinery at Pointe-à-Pierre).

By 1892, Gokool was able to purchase Diamond, Greenhill and River Estates, comprising almost the whole Diego Martin valley, which he developed as cocoa plantations.

From cocoa he moved on the real estate, by 1918, Gokool took advantage of recession prices in the wake of World War I and brought several properties in Port-of-Spain.

The ornate faux classical-style building, with its plush red-carpeted walls, could seat over 1,000 people in balcony and pit, and cost over $80,000 to construct.