Indian indentured labourers | Andrew Harvard Photography

We woke up early on Saturday the 30th of March and the ladies set about preparing a large sumptuous pot of vegetable biryani.

At about 11:15 we arrived at the Isipingo Mariamman Temple and attended to prayers before returning to the vehicle to feed approximately seventy members of the public (the pot emptied quickly and I have already threatened to return next year with a pot at least twice the size).

Unfortunately, no photography was allowed inside the temple but I will try and convince the guardians there to let me in one day to take some “free” photos for their use and mine (on this blog only).

The inside of the temple grounds and prayer building is beautiful and well worth a visit.

Ulwazi provides the following information:

“The celebration of Easter is generally associated and related to the people of Christian faith, however in Durban with our mixed cultures of diversity, Easter also marks an important period for local Durban Hindus. It is referred to as an annual pilgrimage and brings hundreds of Hindus together to pay homage to the deity Goddess Mariamman at the Isipingo Mariamman Temple on the south of Durban or the Mount Edgecombe Temple in the North of Durban as tradition.

The tradition of paying homage to the temple during the Easter period was started by the Indian indentured labourers who had the opportunity to visit the temple when their white sugar cane plantation owners went overseas during the Easter holidays.

The other reasoning is that at this time Hindus pay tribute and gratitude to the Goddess for good health and prosperity. It is believed that the goddess blessed and healed sick people in South India during drought and an outbreak of measles, the visit to the temple also co-relates to the porridge prayer festivals done at home, it is the same deity that is worshipped during the porridge prayer festival.

It is only during Easter these temples are open to the public and it is more a tradition that was passed on from generation to generation. The Mariamman Temple in Isipingo rail was a private owned temple built by Mr Narainsamy in the early 1860s. It is said to be built over a puthu or a mount that is believed to be a home of a sacred snake goddess that is a form of Mother Mariamman. For Hindus, forming a temple on these sites would be more auspicious.

The temple at Isipingo was taken over by Narainsamy’s wife and son when he died in 1914. The festival was held over the Easter weekend and drew around 13,000 Indian labourers by train only. They would offer chickens to sacrifice, money, fruits, milk and eggs to the puthu. They would also bath the idol of Mariamman in the temple and perform hourly prayers. The temple use to be open for 24 hours at that time. The same rituals applied to the temple in Mount Edgecombe which was built by Mr Kistappa Reddy who came to Durban as an indentured labourer.

The trend still exists and every year in Durban presently, during Easter Hindus make a trip to the Isipingo temple to pay tribute and worship Mother Mariamman. The worshippers buy fruit and milk and little idols that represent a male or female and place them in a basket.

The idols are used to ask the goddess for good health. Some devotees offer saris, eggs or chickens to sacrifice in addition. The people that offer chickens have it turned around them and thrown onto the temple roof, where it is later sacrificed and the blood offered to Mariamman to appease her. They go around the temple three times and join a line that leads into the temple.

Before they enter the temple they offer the decorated puthu the milk and proceed into the temple to perform their final worship. The sacred cobra, a form of the Mariamman is said to be inside the mount and does not reveal its presence and the person that sights the cobra if it comes out, is said to be fortunate.

The temple environment is buzzing around this time and there are people who cook food and feed on the temple parking premises as a means of charity. There are also now stalls at the temple with people walking around and shopping for both clothing and edible items”.

While I was happily taking photos a week or two back, I did not realise that “Clairwood residents are fighting for their monuments (homes)”.

I did a little research and found that The Independent on Saturday reported the following:

“Clairwood residents are fighting to stay in their south Durban homes – one of the first settlements of Indian indentured labourers – and have vowed to save their listed and national monument buildings from demolition.

Temples, churches and old homes are the legacy of the first Indian settlers in KwaZulu Natal, but Clairwood residents feel their history and homes are under threat as the new dig-out port at the old Durban International airport begins to take shape.

It is for this reason that the few remaining residents in the area are putting up a fight against being driven out as the eThekwini municipality aims to create a back-of-port logistics hub in their suburb.

Chairman of the Clairwood Ratepayers Association Rishi Singh said Clairwood was one of the first settlements of Indian people in KwaZulu-Natal.

“The heritage cannot be replaced. We have listed buildings and religious places, and people like Judge Navi Pillay and the late minister Roy Padayachie all come from here”

Singh said residents were worried about how the dig-out port would affect their lives, and said no consultation had been done with the community before the release of the draft back-of-port plans.

“They are saying we won’t be affected, and then they say that we might – they have no answer for us,” said Singh.

He said the municipality allowed illegal businesses to flourish in the area and were now using that as an excuse to rezone the area for business. “How can you justify that?”

The idyllic setting of Clairwood became an area where Indian indentured labourers, who had completed their contracts, settled to raise their families. Despite eking out a living by cultivating vegetables, the community built temples, churches, schools and community centres.

The St Louis Catholic Church on Jacobs Rd is a national monument.

Prof Dianne Scott, from UKZN’s School of Development Studies, in her thesis on Clairwood, aspects of which are contained in a 2010 souvenir brochure of Clairwood to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the arrival of Indians in South Africa, describes Clairwood as the heart of early Indian settlement in Durban. It was in the area known as the South Coast Junction, or Clairwood and District, that the largest Indian settlement outside India became established in the 1880’s.

The market gardens created by the residents supplied vegetables, fruit and flowers to Durban and Pietermaritzburg.

In the 1950s, the Durban City Council wanted to rezone Clairwood as an industrial area, to create a racially-zoned city and industrialise the south.

According to Scott, the Clairwood and District Residents and Ratepayers Association opposed the move, but the removal of people in the area by the city was undertaken via the termination of leases on council-owned property and through expropriation of land. Individual premises were demolished as slums. It was estimated that about 40 000 people had to leave the area.

And now, history might be repeating itself.

Public meetings are under way in Clairwood, Merebank, Isipingo and the Bluff to hear residents’ concerns.

eThekwini municipality has maintained that no resident, listed buildings or religious places of worship would be forced to move.

The Independent on Saturday visited Clairwood to find out which buildings the community is guarding so fiercely.

The area is a mix of face-brick houses and secure, opulent homes sitting adjacent to dilapidated homes inhabited by squatters, plus the bane of the community – trucking businesses.

Despite the odd mix, residents do not want to move and Singh said the community would fight to protect their buildings that have formed a central part of their daily lives over the past 150 years.

Just off the Old South Coast Road sits the St Louis Catholic Church, a national monument, which was named after King Louis XVI of France.

In the second half of the 19th century, Mauritian Creole families also settled in Clairwood, bringing with them their culture and Catholic faith.

In 1942 Father Weist and the parishioners built the present church. The other church, which was on the corner of Jacobs and South Coast roads, was not suitable.

The Shree Siva Soobramoniar Temple, known as the Sirdar Road temple, is a well-known place of worship.

The history of the temple dates back to 1889 and even today chariot parades and various religious observances are performed at the temple, which was built with money donated by the community.

The Muslim community in Clairwood needed a cemetery and Madrassah (a place of learning), and in the early 1900’s the Flower Road Mosque was built. The land was purchased from the Durban council using donations from the community, and the cemetery also served the greater Durban area.

With red, polished floors and cream and green-trimmed pillars, the Clairwood Boy’s Primary School, in Done Road, is on the heritage list. The pretty and well maintained courtyard area forms the anchor of the classroom blocks that wrap around it, with some of the original wooden beams still standing strong.

Several other wood-and-iron buildings are still standing.

Ros Devereaux, of the heritage body Amafa, said these buildings made them items of historical importance, and because these buildings were listed – meaning that they have been identified as being of historical importance and more than 60 years old – it was difficult to demolish them.

“These buildings are typical of the old Clairwood, and there are several in the area, but under extreme circumstances demolition would be allowed,” said Devereaux.