When, on June 5, 1873, the Lalla Rookh docked in Fort Nieuw Amsterdam, Suriname, 399 indentured British Indian immigrants had almost reached their destination: the colonial plantations. The timing was no coincidence. On July 1, 1863, the Dutch government had abolished slavery in its Caribean colonies. During a ten-year transition period the former slave were to work for employers of their own choice under the supervision of the state.Three weeks before this mandatory “apprenticeship” period was over, the Lalla Rookh arrived. The immigrants aboard had signed a contract obliging them to work for five years on a plantation in Suriname yet to be assigned. The labor contract and additional local ordinances specified the rights and duties of the indentured workers and forced them to commit their labor power to the unspecified demands of their employers at specified times. Fundamental to the system was the penal sanction, which gave employers the right to press criminal charges against indentured workers who, according to them, neglected their duty or refused to work. Thus the penal sanction allowed planters to impose their own conception of work discipline.
