East Indians

The establishment of the British factory system in India destroyed Indian industries such as home spinning of cloth and created a mobile population. An increase in the Indian population depended on the land for their livelihood was accompanied by the division of plots until they reached uneconomic levels. Indebtedness grew and cultivators lost their land. Emigration to the West Indies promised to put them in possession of land once more.Indian immigration succeeded in providing labor which the earlier attempts to recruit Meridians, Europeans, Chinese and free Africans had failed to do.Trinidad exports of sugar increased five times between 1833 and 1896 and nearly all field labor was done by the East Indians. Displaced workers in cottage industries and agriculture and labourers experiencing seasonal unemployment wander in search of work when jobs could not be obtained they were ready to listen to the recruiters propaganda. The reputation of being fit only for poorest labouring jobs followed the east Indians when they left the plantations to join the free society after his indenture. Indians were mocked for their spoken languages, their clothing and despised as heathens. Those who went into the towns found that there were nothing but coolie workers as porters and sweepers. The promise of higher wages in the West Indies than could be obtained in India together with the possibilities of greater savings and to be living was a powerful argument to leave India. Criminals escaping from the police and afraid to return to their villages. The coolies were drawn from the poor streets of the slums of the cities of Bombay, Calcutta and Madras.

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