The Forgotten Genocide: The Brutal History of Tamil Indentured Laborers in Guadeloupe

GUADELOUPE, June 19, 2025 (The Commune): For over 150 years, the horrific suffering of Tamil indentured laborers in Guadeloupe remained buried under colonial silence. But a groundbreaking research paper presented at the 2025 Global India Diaspora Conference has finally exposed the genocide of over 30,000 Tamil Hindus in this French Caribbean colony. Between 1845 and 1900, tens of thousands of Tamils from the Madras Presidency were lured into indentured servitude in Guadeloupe under false promises of prosperity. Instead, they were subjected to brutal working conditions on sugar plantations, with 16-hour workdays under scorching heat, starvation, disease and torture, leading to an estimated 30,400 deaths—a figure derived from French colonial records. There were also forced Christian conversions, banning of Hindu practices and suppression of the Tamil language.

One remarkable figure who challenged these oppressive conditions and secured justice for his community was Henry Sidambaram (1863–1955) — a Guadeloupe-born man of Tamil ancestry — often called the French Caribbean’s Gandhi. His crusade for justice and civic rights for the Girmityas (as the indentured workers were known) stands as a powerful affirmation of human dignity and resistance against systematic racial discrimination. Starting his legal battle in 1904, Henry Sidambaram fought relentlessly for nearly two decades against a policy that kept Girmityas stateless, powerless and without civic representation. His struggles culminated in a landmark French court ruling in 1923, which recognized the Girmityas’ French citizenship and their fundamental right to vote — a dramatic reversal after decades of systematic disenfranchisement. This ruling opened a path toward civic participation for Guadeloupe’s diaspora community and a new era in their collective future. The Tamil diaspora in Guadeloupe, now numbering over 100,000, still preserves its heritage. But justice remains denied. As global calls for colonial reparations grow louder, this research demands official recognition of the Tamil genocide by France, that this genocide be included in school curricula worldwide. They also demand reparations for descendants of indentured laborers.

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