NCIC prepares for Divali Nagar 2019

Public relations officer of the National Council for Indian Culture (NCIC), Surudeo Mangaroo signals the start of Divali Nagar this year with auditions for the Youth Champ competition. Mangaroo will be going to four venues in TT in search of talent for the annual competition for Divali Nagar which will take place at the Nagar Site in Charlieville, Chaguanas.

“We intend to look at youth-performers in the categories of dance, vocals, music and queens in the villages of this country. Those selected will be given the opportunity to shine on this stage before an international audience since they will be streaming live in other countries.”

The nine days of Divali Nagar this year, he said, will be from October 18 - 26, marking 33 years since it began. The first audition took place on Sunday at the Bluebirds Cultural Centre, Sookhan Trace, Barrackpore and was co-ordinated by Gautam Maharaj.

The second audition will be held next Sunday at the Swaha Hindu College, Coalmine Road, Sangre Grande, and will be co-ordinated by Shalini Juteram. The bandwagon will then move to Point Fortin Hindu Temple on August 18 to be co-ordinated by Shankar Teelucksingh. The final audition will be held jointly with the Mahatma Gandhi Cultural Organisation on August 24 at the NCIC headquarters.

India’s artist Baba Satnarayan Mourya will put together the exhibition for this year’s theme "Hindu Grant" (Hindu Texts). The NCIC annual yagna (prayer meeting) precedes Divali Nagar, commencing on October 6. Pundit Abhedanand Persad Sharma will be officiating.

This year, the NCIC will honour the UK-based Trinidadian author Dr Latchmi Persaud, 70, originally from Pasea, Tunapuna.

Persaud attended the Tunapuna Government Primary School then St Augustine Girls' High School and, later, St Joseph’s Convent, Port of Spain.

She left TT in 1957 to study for her bachelor of arts degree and her PhD at Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland, and her postgraduate Diploma in Education at University of Reading, UK. Her doctoral thesis was The Need for and the Possibilities of Agricultural Diversification in Barbados, West Indies.

Persaud is the wife of economist Professor Bishnodat Persaud. They both have three children – psychiatrist Rajendra Persaud, financial economist Professor Avinash Persaud, and Sharda Dean.

Persaud taught at various schools in the Caribbean including St Augustine Girl’s High School, Bishop Anstey High School, Tunapuna Hindu School, Queen’s College in Guyana and in Barbados at Harrison College and St Michael School.

After Persaud ended her career in teaching, she became a freelance journalist writing articles on socio-economic issues for newspapers and magazines for many years. She also read and simultaneously recorded books in philosophy, economics and literature for the Royal National Institute for the Blind in London.

She began a new career in the late 1980s writing fiction. Her short story See Saw Margery Daw was broadcast by the BBC World Service November 1995.