PRINCIPLE OF FAIRNESS

A legal suit had been brought by the Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha and the Islamic Relief Centre. It is a pity, however, that the Maha Sabha had not requested the Orishas to be joined in the suit against the Government. Indeed, the discrimination is not merely against the Hindus and Moslems as the legal action sought to demonstrate, but against those of the Orisha and the Shango faiths as well. Justice Jamadar’s judgment, although the Judge recognised, and stated this, that the Court could not change the name of Trinidad and Tobago’s highest award as it was the declared law of the land, was a needed statement.

I admit that I am not a religious person, nonetheless I am willing, and always have been, to support any thinking which points Trinidad and Tobago toward the road heading to the setting out and establishment of a principle of fairness. In addition, my support, then, for what Justice Jamadar’s ruling says is not based on any personal religious beliefs, but on a lifelong respect for fairplay and, ironically, many of the religious teachings I had taken in during my childhood.

I note with interest that the General Secretary of the Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha, Mr Sat Maharaj, has been reported as saying that he was prepared to take the issue [of the Trinity Cross] internationally. Does this mean that apart from sensitising international organisations he will seek to apprise leading nationwide groups in, for example, the United States of America, the United Kingdom, India, France, Nigeria, Pakistan and Egypt? Within recent months several other persons have been threatening, admittedly for non religious reasons, to take virtually every issue on which they disagree with Government to the court of international opinion.

Should the Maha Sabha’s General Secretary seek the assistance of the British his advisers should alert him that there is religious discrimination represented in at least two significant areas of officialdom in the United Kingdom — the Act of Settlement 1701 and the Lord Chancellor’s (Tenure of Office and Discharge of Ecclesiastical Functions) Act 1954. These are areas in which in the United Kingdom religious discrimination goes even beyond simply the ground of religion per se to discrimination on the ground of sect. For example, a British Monarch is required to be not merely a Christian but a member of the Church of England. Indeed, the monarch is the Head of the Church of England. In turn, and this may provide needed food for thought for the Maha Sabha General Secretary, until 1974 the Cabinet post of Lord Chancellor could not have been held by a non Anglican. Today, if the Lord Chancellor who, incidentally, heads the Judiciary, adheres to the Roman Catholic faith, the British Monarch, Queen Elizabeth, may arrange for Prime Minister Tony Blair to carry out his religious functions! Any question of his being of the Hindu or Moslem faith is not even considered.

Meanwhile, in the United States a part of the wording on all of its currency notes — “In God we trust” — is clearly discriminatory to Shangoites, Hindus and Orishas, among others. The God referred to on the US currency notes relates to the Christian definition of God. In Trinidad and Tobago, although there have been high profile non judicial Hindus, who have either declined to accept the Trinity Cross or urged others not to do so on the ground that it was discriminatory, there have been no reports, media or otherwise, of adherents of non Christian sects or those which do not recognise Abraham as the first prophet, refusing to handle or deal in United States currency.

In Pakistan it would be unthinkable for a Hindu or Christian to be President. However, the problems which Mr Maharaj may encounter internationally should he pursue his signalled action in no way diminishes his organisation’s charge that the Order of the Trinity is discriminatory. Whether he and others of the Maha Sabha and the Islamic Relief Centre, which had joined the Maha Sabha in the legal action, ultimately take the Trinity Cross issue internationally is a decision that they and they alone will have to take. In the end although they may not receive support at the top, they may, nonetheless, receive support on the ground in the pursuit of extending the Principle of Fairness to the international stage.