INTRODUCING ASSAD BHUGLAH’S New Book – “Community...

MOOMTAZ EMRITH

(Windsor, ON, Canada)

Assad Bhuglah, as an author and historian, needs no introduction. He has, over the years, come to make a name for himself as such and also as a prolific writer with an impressive output of books on the social history of Mauritius and its multi-cultural and multi-ethnic society. In fact, the bulk of Assad’s work is a vibrant testimony to his talent as an avid researcher and chronicler of our history.   Besides, Assad Bhuglah is a raconteur par excellence.  His close to a dozen books or so, produced over the past decade, on Mauritius’ history and some of its unsung heroes, have helped generate renewed interest in Mauritius’ cultural and social history.

Assad Bhuglah is a trained Economist by profession and has also been a seasoned Trade Diplomat, who served as Mauritius’ top International Trade Negotiator at the Mauritius’ Ministry of External Affairs, for many years prior to his retirement in 2016. As a matter of fact, soon after his retirement, Assad burst on the literary scene of Mauritius as a seasoned and respected historian, who took the Mauritius’ literary world by surprise with a well-researched book on a long-forgotten ‘hero’ in Mauritius history: Dr. Idrice Ameer Goumany, a descendant of the lascars, who lived in what is now known as Plaine Verte, in the east side of Port Louis. Dr. Goumany, who had just returned home to Port Louis, Mauritius, after completing his medical studies in Scotland, took employment as Head of the Quarantine Station at Pointe aux Cannoniers, near Grand Bay, where he, unfortunately, soon after fell victim to the epidemic and eventually died as a result. He was in his early thirties. Dr. Goumany became a classic example of “victime du devoir” and he would be interred in the compound of the Quarantine Station, where his grave-site has now become a place of annual visitation in memory of his ultimate sacrifice in the service of his patients. Unfortunately, for many years, Dr. Goumany’s name would remain almost ‘forgotten’ in Mauritian history — that is till Assad Bhuglah wrote his book on his life-story in 2017. In fact, Assad Bhuglah devoted his first book to Dr. Goumany’s short life; how he sacrificed his life in providing care to his patients – mostly Indian indentured labourers infected with the epidemic and quarantined at the Station. Ironically, for many years, Dr. Goumany’s name would literally remain ‘forgotten’ to history.

That first book on the late Dr. Idrice Goumany would be the beginning of Assad Bhuglah’s dabbling in Mauritian history and some of its unsung heroes who, in their own ways, had made significant contributions to the evolution of Mauritius as a country, thus evolving as a model of harmonious living with its multicultural society.

It is in light of this that Assad Bhuglah’s bulk of his work should be viewed because what is Mauritius after all? It is the sum of its parts, of its communities and its rich cultural mosaic and its citizens are ever at home