‘Master Coolie’ arrives, the Natal Mercury proclaimed, when the Truro landed at Port Natal on 16 November 1860 with 339 Indian workers aboard. Over 150,000 indentured labourers were to follow in their wake.
This week marks 155 years since the first indentured arrived in South Africa from the Indian subcontinent. In the absence of letters, newspaper articles and diaries, it is difficult to develop individual biographies of indentured labourers. But given the British penchant for keeping records, one can trace the lives of a few indentured, especially through court cases, appeals to the authorities and petitions to the ironically named Office of the Protector. The results of this endeavour can be startling and contradict prevailing ideas.
Ashwin Desai Votti arrived in May 1890 from a village near Madras. She was 18 and slightly over five feet tall. We have no photograph of her, but by all accounts she was beautiful; one official document described her as a “woman of prepossessing appearance”.
She was single. In fact, no one from her caste or village was on the ship, but this did not overwhelm the young woman. She fought to be allocated to Gavin Caldwell of Ifafa with shipmates Govindsamy Veerasami Naik and Bappu Ponnusami. She lived with Naik as “man and wife”. Naik hanged himself in November 1890. Shortly after his death, Votti began living with Bappu.
By early 1891, she was giving Caldwell a “great deal of trouble”. He complained that Votti was constantly “running off” to adjoining estates and refused to work:
“My indentured Coolie man Bappu and the woman Votti were put in Umzinto jail for seven days for desertion… It is the confounded woman who I blame. She will not work… I wish you could indenture the woman to some Victoria sugar estate unknown to him… I insist upon the man coming back to work and it is no use for him to say he cannot live here without her. He gives her a good beating everyday in the week.”
Caldwell was unsuccessful in getting rid of Votti because, in the Protector’s judgment, her “conduct and character were too well known in the neighbourhood”.
Votti remained defiant and challenged Caldwell in court in 1893:
“I came from India with a man and we were indentured at Umzinto. He is dead. He committed suicide by hanging himself… My master [Caldwell] said that as I was a single woman he did not want to keep me unless I got a husband and I said I did not want a husband and my Master became disagreeable.”
In March 1892, Votti was again sent to the Protector with instructions to transfer her. The Protector succeeded in transferring her to Charlie Nulliah on 24 March 1892. Love-struck Bappu sought to follow, but Votti shattered his hopes when she told the Protector: “I have no husband in the colony although I have been living with Bappu… I do not wish to live any longer with Bappu.”
Nulliah was the son of indentured migrants who had arrived in 1863. He had prospered in various commercial endeavours and was an employer of indentured labour by the 1890s. Nulliah and Votti’s relationship turned sour within a few months, and she submitted several petitions for another transfer.
Votti contended that she had transferred to Nulliah “ostensibly to act as nurse to his children”, but was made to work in the stable and kitchen. She complained of sexual harassment. Nulliah made “indecent overtures to me …. He wanted me to come to him as his wife. I refused to do so. I told him, you have a wife and children, why should I come to you?”
Votti complained to the Protector in Durban. He instructed her to return to Nulliah but she refused. Instead, she spent the next seven months in prison, theoretically for being “without a pass”, but in actual fact, for refusing to return to Nulliah. She was sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour on four occasions. In Votti’s words: “They used to bring me into court and ask if I would go back to my master and then they sent me to gaol. I am not ready to go back and I will not go back. You can cut my throat but I will not go back… I came to work, not to be a wife to my master.”
In a deposition to Administrator Haden, Votti claimed that it was “quite unusual” to indenture an unmarried Indian woman to an Indian male employer. She wanted her indenture to Nulliah cancelled, and to be “transferred to some respectable European person”.
Votti’s allegation of assault against Nulliah was tested in court on 29 March 1892. He denied the charges and was supported by Hungermuthoo, who had been working for Nulliah for three years, and Sirdar Ramlingam. In the court’s view, the charges of assault and indecent overtures could not be proved.
Attorney-General Gallwey petitioned the Colonial Secretary on 11 April 1893 to transfer Votti, highlighting that “sexual desire” was the only reason that Nulliah refused to transfer Votti. The fact that Votti had spent seven months in prison and “her readiness to undergo the same again, and more, implies the existence of some good reason such as the main one stated by her for her determination never to return to him”. Votti, in contrast, “bears a general good character and has worked lately for the magistrate [Barter] for fourteen days and gave satisfaction to him”. Gallwey felt that there had been a miscarriage of justice.
Protector Mason disagreed and felt that Votti had trumped up the charges to annul her contract. Gallwey persisted and Mason eventually relented and cancelled her contract on 31 May 1893.
Votti had to complete her five-year term, and she was offered employment under Deane Anthony, who owned a “respectable Indian eating house and was known as of good character”, until she completed her five years on 27 May 1895.
This is not the last we hear of Votti. In October 1893, she married Rangasami Damodrapilla while still under indenture. Theirs was a violent six-year marriage. Rangasami was fined for assaulting Votti in June 1898. The following year, on 23 August 1899, he stabbed her and was imprisoned for three years.
In March 1900, Votti instituted proceedings for a juridical separation “on grounds of cruelty”, and sued for maintenance, a half share of his assets, and cost of the suit. She testified that Rangasami was abusive and that her life would be in danger if forced to live with him. Rangasami, in his defence, claimed that his marriage had been “extremely unhappy” because of Votti’s “violent temper, extravagant habits in contracting numerous debts, neglect to provide and prepare family meals, thus compelling him to cook his own meals at all times”, and “loose conduct in constantly sleeping away from the house, sometimes for days at a time”.
In August 1899, he flung a knife at Votti “in a fit of temper”, for which he was “suffering” imprisonment and “for which he expresses deep contrition and regret”. Rangasami testified that he had handed over his salary every month to Votti for household expenses and the bond on a property. As the incarcerated Rangasami did not have an income, he applied for Votti’s order to be dismissed with costs.
The court ruled in Votti’s favour, granting a divorce with costs and dividing the assets equally.
It is at this point that Votti disappears from the archives. Like thousands of other indentured migrants, her story, tragically can never be recovered. Votti’s narrative is one of confronting indenture, though it meant consecutive terms of imprisonment; the perils of being a single woman; refusing “sexual” favours even if it meant beatings and ridicule; and adeptly using the legal system for protection. Courageous, she was held down by no man, socially or sexually.
Historian Hugh Tinker wrote of indentured women as a “sorry sisterhood of single, broken creatures”. Votti’s life confronts this description. She faced down the discrimination and scorn of both the male indentured and the white plantation bosses. And, still she could never be broken.
(Ashwin Desai is a Professor of Sociology with the University of Johannesburg, and co-author, with Goolam Vahed, of Inside Indian Indenture)
