Bhelupur, January 12: In search of her roots, Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago Kamla Persad-Bissessar visited Bhelupur village in Bihar’s Buxar District from where her ancestors had migrated to Caribbean Islands over a century ago.
The entire village as well as hundreds from neighbouring areas gathered for a glimpse of the “daughter of Bhelpur” when Bissessar set foot in the land of her ancestors for the first time on Wednesday.
A helicopter carrying Bissessar, the first woman prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago, descended on a specially constructed helipad near the village in Itarhi block of Buxar district, about 125 km from state capital Patna.
Bissessar’s ancestors migrated from Bihar to the Caribbean islands in the 19th century. She was in India to attend the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas in Jaipur, but did not lose the opportunity to return to her roots in Bihar.
She and her entourage reached here in two IAF choppers. She straightaway went to the house of her uncle Jagdish Mishra on foot and spent a good 40 minutes there meeting women and children.
Accompanied by husband Gregory Bissessar and other relatives who came from Port of Spain, she was overwhelmed by the people’s response.
Expressing her gratitude, she said, “one who did not know one’s root would not know where one was headed for.”
—-Agencies