THE INDIANS OF FIJI

Te Ao Hou, Summer 1953, Page 29

THE INDIANS OF FIJI The Indians have been brought to Fiji and promised equal rights, but find it most difficult to buy land. The Indians are thrifty, hard-working: and fine cultivators, and have strong family attachments. The home country of the India is India, but his family home is increasingly in Fiji, for he was born there. Of the countries outside Fiji, India is where his sympathies lie. Some of the Fijian Indians feel, in The ‘Emperor’ mine in Fiji. Gold mining only started seriously some fifteen years ago, but production now is some £7,000,000 per year.

Viti Lavu. The sugar industry is the most important industry in Fiji. The Colonial Sugar Refining Company of Australia operates five mills with a total capacity of 171,000 lbs. per season. fact, that India should have been asked to govern Fiji, for are not the Indians the working colonisers! The Fijians, on the other hand, asked Queen Victoria to protect them, and though half a cenutry ago they wanted to federate with New Zealand, today they probably prefer to await self-government under a British Governor, with the New Zealanders taking a friendly interest on the side. Fiji has its two peoples and its two traditions side by side. They each have their values, and the problem is how to preserve the Fijian ways while giving greater political freedom to all, and preserving justice for all. Indian children going to school.

Indians have become the largest racial group in the Colony. Almost all tailors, laundrymen and boot-makers are Indians, some of whose women and children are shown in the photo. The first Indians were brought to Fiji as indentured labour in the 1880's. The Fijians precede any event of importance with the traditional offering of Yaqona (kava) and a magiti (feast). Spokesman is making presentation of yaqona root, cooked food and whole roasted pigs.