Fiji History MuseumTravel to the past.

LESSON PLAN · 6 CHAPTERS

Indenture

Print this page for the worksheet: the plan prints first, then one sheet per pupil pair.

A forty-minute lesson

5 min — Arrive. Open The arrival of the Leonidas on the projector and look around its 360° scene together.

15 min — Work from sources. Give each pair one chapter from the list below. They read its facts, open one source and fill in the worksheet.

10 min — Compare. Pairs with different chapters explain to each other what their chapter says and which source supports it.

10 min — Check. Each pair names one thing their source does not tell them, and who might know it — a family elder, a village, an archive.

Chapters in this era

  1. The arrival of the Leonidas · Girmit · 5 sources
  2. Recruitment and the agreement · Girmit · 5 sources
  3. Life in the lines · Girmit · 5 sources
  4. Sugar and the CSR · Girmit · 4 sources
  5. Ending indenture · Girmit · 7 sources
  6. After girmit · Girmit · 6 sources

Worksheet: The arrival of the Leonidas

Name(s):

The museum says

  • The ship Leonidas arrived at Levuka on 14 May 1879 carrying the first indentured labourers from India.
  • Cholera and smallpox broke out on the voyage, and the passengers were held in quarantine before going to the plantations.
  • Later ships landed their passengers at the depot on Nukulau Island near Suva.

1. Which source supports one of these sentences? Write its name.

2. Who wrote or made that source, and when? Were they Fijian, or a visitor?

3. What does the source not tell us? Who could we ask?

Sources for this chapter: Wikipedia: Leonidas (ship) · Wikipedia: Nukulau · Wikipedia: Indo-Fijians · Girmit.org · History · National Archives of Fiji / National Library of Australia · Emigration passes

Worksheet: Recruitment and the agreement

Name(s):

The museum says

  • “Girmit” comes from “agreement”, the contract the labourers signed; those who came are called Girmitiya.
  • Most were recruited in northern India and sailed from the emigration depot at Garden Reach, Calcutta; from 1903 ships also left from Madras in the south.
  • The contract was for five years; after ten years in Fiji a labourer could claim a free passage home.

1. Which source supports one of these sentences? Write its name.

2. Who wrote or made that source, and when? Were they Fijian, or a visitor?

3. What does the source not tell us? Who could we ask?

Sources for this chapter: Wikipedia: Indian indenture system · Wikipedia: Indo-Fijians · Girmit.org · History · National Archives of Fiji / National Library of Australia · Emigration passes · The Agreement and the Girmitiya · Harvard Law Review

Worksheet: Life in the lines

Name(s):

The museum says

  • Labourers lived in rows of barrack rooms called “lines”, with little privacy.
  • Work was set by daily tasks, and wages could be cut by fines and penalties.
  • Far fewer women came than men, and women faced particularly hard conditions.

1. Which source supports one of these sentences? Write its name.

2. Who wrote or made that source, and when? Were they Fijian, or a visitor?

3. What does the source not tell us? Who could we ask?

Sources for this chapter: Wikipedia: Indian indenture system · Wikipedia: Indo-Fijians · Australian National University · Women, Indenture, and Resistance · The Agreement and the Girmitiya · Harvard Law Review · Girmit.org · History

Worksheet: Sugar and the CSR

Name(s):

The museum says

  • The Australian Colonial Sugar Refining Company (CSR) began milling in Fiji in 1882 and came to dominate the industry.
  • Mills at places such as Nausori, Rarawai (Ba), Lautoka and Labasa were fed by narrow-gauge cane railways.
  • CSR left Fiji in 1973 and its mills passed to the Fiji Sugar Corporation.

1. Which source supports one of these sentences? Write its name.

2. Who wrote or made that source, and when? Were they Fijian, or a visitor?

3. What does the source not tell us? Who could we ask?

Sources for this chapter: Wikipedia: Colonial Sugar Refining Company · Wikipedia: Fiji Sugar Corporation · ANU · Brown or white? A history of the Fiji sugar industry · Girmit.org · History

Worksheet: Ending indenture

Name(s):

The museum says

  • Totaram Sanadhya’s account of his years as a labourer in Fiji, published in India in 1914, raised public anger.
  • In India, Gopal Krishna Gokhale moved a resolution against indenture in 1912, and Mahatma Gandhi also campaigned against it.
  • C. F. Andrews and W. W. Pearson reported on conditions in Fiji in 1916.

1. Which source supports one of these sentences? Write its name.

2. Who wrote or made that source, and when? Were they Fijian, or a visitor?

3. What does the source not tell us? Who could we ask?

Sources for this chapter: Wikipedia: Totaram Sanadhya · Wikipedia: C. F. Andrews · Wikipedia: Gopal Krishna Gokhale · Wikipedia: Indian indenture system · Girmit.org · History · The Agreement and the Girmitiya · Harvard Law Review · National Archives of Fiji / National Library of Australia · Emigration passes

Worksheet: After girmit

Name(s):

The museum says

  • Many Girmitiyas remained in Fiji, farming and building communities; others returned to India.
  • Fiji Hindi grew out of the languages they brought with them.
  • Hindu temples, mosques and churches built by their descendants are found across Fiji.

1. Which source supports one of these sentences? Write its name.

2. Who wrote or made that source, and when? Were they Fijian, or a visitor?

3. What does the source not tell us? Who could we ask?

Sources for this chapter: Wikipedia: Indo-Fijians · Wikipedia: Fiji Hindi · Wikipedia: Hinduism in Fiji · Girmit.org · History · National Archives of Fiji / National Library of Australia · Emigration passes · Fiji Government · Girmit commemoration