Indian indenture system
This resulted in the development of a large South Asian diaspora in the Caribbean,[3] Natal (South Africa), East Africa, Réunion, Mauritius, Sri Lanka,[4] Malaysia,[5] Myanmar and Fiji, as well as the growth of Indo-South African, Indo-Caribbean, Indo-East African, Indo-Mauritian, Indo-Fijian, Indo-Lankan Tamil, Indo-Malaysian, Indo-Burmese and Indo-Singaporean populations.
[8] The East India Company's Regulations of 1837 laid down specific conditions for the dispatch of Indian labour from Calcutta.
On 29 May 1839, overseas manual labour was prohibited and any person effecting such emigration was liable to a 200 Rupee fine or three months in jail.
For example, between 1848 and 1851 Indian immigration was stopped towards British Guiana because of the economic and political unrest due to the Sugar Duties Act 1846.
The existing regulations failed to stamp out abuses of the system, which continued, including recruitment by false pretences and consequently, in 1843 the Government of Bengal, was forced to restrict emigration from Calcutta, only permitting departure after the signing of a certificate from the Agent and countersigned by the Protector.
Migration to Mauritius continued, with 9,709 male unskilled labourers (Dhangars), and 1,840 female wives and daughters transported in 1844.
The repatriation of Indians who had completed indenture remained a problem with a high death rate and investigations revealed that regulations for the return voyages were not being satisfactorily followed.
After the end of slavery, the European-led West Indian sugar colonies tried the use of emancipated slaves, families from Ireland, Germany and Malta and Portuguese from Madeira.
All these efforts failed to satisfy the labour needs of the colonies due to high mortality of the new arrivals and their reluctance to continue working at the end of their indenture.
Transportation to the Caribbean stopped in 1848 due to problems in the sugar industry and resumed in Demerara and Trinidad in 1851 and Jamaica in 1860.
[citation needed] Importing indentured labour became viable for plantation owners because newly emancipated slaves refused to work for low wages.
The influx of Indian workers diminished the competitive leverage and bargaining power of the freed slaves, marginalizing their position within the so-called plantocracy system persisting in the British colonies.
Trinidad followed a different trend where the Government offered the labourers a stake in the colony by providing real inducements to settle when their indentures had expired.
The success of the Indian indenture system for the British, at a terrible human cost, did not remain unnoticed.
It was not until 25 July 1860 that France was officially permitted by the British authorities to recruit labour for Reunion at a rate of 6,000 annually.
Emigration to Natal was approved on 7 August 1860, and the first ship from Madras arrived in Durban on 16 November 1860, forming the basis of the Indian South African community.
There was a high mortality rate in the one ship load sent to St Croix, and following adverse reports from the British Consul on the treatment of indentured labourers, further emigration was stopped.
Colonial British Government regulations of 1864 made general provisions for recruitment of Indian labour in an attempt to minimise abuse of the system.
For example, in Demerara an ordinance in 1864 made it a crime for a labourer to be absent from work, misbehaving or not completing five tasks each week.
Labourers were signed up for five years and were provided with a return passage at the end of this term, but were to be subject to Dutch law.
This figure does not include the 30,000 who went to Mauritius earlier, labourers who went to Ceylon or Malaya and illegal recruitment to the French colonies.
[19] According to The Economist, "When the Imperial Legislative Council finally ended indenture because of pressure from Indian nationalists and declining profitability, rather than from humanitarian concerns.
