KISNA - FROM WHENCE WE CAME: BRITISH INDIA TO BRITISH GUIANA

A historical drama, this full-length hybrid play captures the historical, geographical, and human elements of the Indian Indenture System from British India to British Guiana. Set in the 1800s, events, places, people's attitudes, and behaviors are as described by governors' reports, newspapers, court records, other archival records, oral history, and transcripts of interviews with survivors and descendants of the system. The play is suitable for both stage and screen. The HMS Wellesley landed in Demerara, British Guiana, on January 10th, 1857, with 361 alive. One infant was born on the voyage, while 22 persons died at sea. Wellesley immigrants were allotted to 12 sugar plantations: Anna Regina, Columbia, Cullen, Devonshire Castle, Golden Fleece, Hampton Court, Land of Plenty, Perseverance, Sparta, Domburg, Marionville, and Chateau Margot. The main characters in the play, KISNA - From Whence We Came: British India to British Guiana, were sent to the plantation Chateau Margot. This play highlights the trials, tribulations, and social and cultural retentions of the indentured labourers on this plantation, which mirror the experiences of our ancestors, the Girmitiyas, who left their homeland and eventually made British Guiana, now Guyana, their home.