Bmobile sponsors Ramleela groups after cuts to Divali Nagar

Shas­tri Boodan

GML con­trib­u­tor

Ram­leela groups across Trinidad and To­ba­go are be­gin­ning to ben­e­fit from spon­sor­ship of more than $40,000 each from bmo­bile, as the Gov­ern­ment moves to in­crease sup­port for com­mu­ni­ty-based cul­tur­al ac­tiv­i­ties.

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath an­nounced the spon­sor­ship ini­tia­tive on Sun­day dur­ing a vis­it to Ram­leela cel­e­bra­tions at Pierre Road, Char­lieville, Ch­agua­nas, where he dis­closed that four or­gan­i­sa­tions had so far re­ceived fund­ing.

Padarath told Guardian Me­dia that each of the four or­gan­i­sa­tions had ben­e­fit­ed from spon­sor­ship ex­ceed­ing $40,000 from bmo­bile, the telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions brand of state-owned Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of T&T (TSTT).

The an­nounce­ment comes days af­ter the Gov­ern­ment in­di­cat­ed that State-owned com­pa­nies would no longer rent booths at Di­vali Na­gar to dis­trib­ute para­pher­na­lia, a prac­tice that had re­port­ed­ly cost hun­dreds of thou­sands an­nu­al­ly.

The shift comes as com­mu­ni­ty or­gan­i­sa­tions re­spon­si­ble for stag­ing Ram­leela and Di­vali cel­e­bra­tions con­tin­ue to re­ly heav­i­ly on fundrais­ing ac­tiv­i­ties and pub­lic do­na­tions to meet their ex­pens­es.

Ad­dress­ing the gath­er­ing at Pierre Road, Padarath said the spon­sor­ship re­flect­ed a com­mit­ment to di­rect­ing re­sources to­wards com­mu­ni­ties that pre­serve Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cul­tur­al her­itage.

“I come not with my hands swing­ing,” he said, an­nounc­ing that bmo­bile was a spon­sor at the Pierre Road Ram­leela cel­e­bra­tions.

Padarath said the spon­sor­ship was be­ing di­rect­ed to­wards com­mu­ni­ties that had worked to pre­serve the cul­tur­al tra­di­tions of their an­ces­tors.

He al­so gave the Ram­leela com­mit­tee an as­sur­ance that bmo­bile would con­tin­ue to sup­port the cel­e­bra­tions un­der the Gov­ern­ment’s cul­tur­al de­vel­op­ment ef­forts.

As Trinidad and To­ba­go pre­pares to cel­e­brate Di­vali 2026, Padarath de­scribed the oc­ca­sion as a cel­e­bra­tion of good over evil and light over dark­ness, while pay­ing trib­ute to the strug­gles of the an­ces­tors who brought their re­li­gious tra­di­tions to the coun­try.

Mean­while, Min­is­ter of Land and Le­gal Af­fairs Sad­dam Ho­sein an­nounced a sep­a­rate com­mit­ment to as­sist Ram­leela or­gan­i­sa­tions seek­ing per­ma­nent lo­ca­tions for their ac­tiv­i­ties.

Ho­sein ac­knowl­edged that while many groups stage their per­for­mances for on­ly one or two weeks each year, they re­quire suit­able spaces where they can op­er­ate and de­vel­op their cul­tur­al pro­grammes through­out the year.

He said the Gov­ern­ment was pre­pared to en­gage with the Fe­lic­i­ty and Pierre Road Ram­leela com­mit­tees to ex­plore op­tions for se­cur­ing per­ma­nent homes.

Ho­sein said such fa­cil­i­ties would not on­ly ben­e­fit the or­gan­i­sa­tions but could al­so help show­case the tal­ent and cul­tur­al her­itage of cen­tral Trinidad to in­ter­na­tion­al au­di­ences.

The an­nounce­ments sig­nal a po­ten­tial boost for Ram­leela com­mit­tees, many of which face fi­nan­cial and lo­gis­ti­cal chal­lenges in stag­ing an­nu­al cel­e­bra­tions while main­tain­ing tra­di­tions passed down through gen­er­a­tions.

Ho­sein said cor­po­rate spon­sor­ship and the prospect of per­ma­nent fa­cil­i­ties, the groups could have greater op­por­tu­ni­ties to pre­serve, de­vel­op and pro­mote one of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s long­stand­ing cul­tur­al tra­di­tions.