The first indentured labourers from India arrived in Trinidad and British Guiana in 1844 and in Jamaica in 1845; about 36,000 came to Jamaica by 1917. Rubin and Comitas found no evidence of cannabis smoking or folk medicine on the island before 1845 and argue that the labourers brought the practice with them. The Hindi word ganja became the usual working-class term and the word used in Jamaican law.[1]
Listed for context. No score change is recorded for Jamaica here.
References
- Ganja in Jamaica: The Effects of Marijuana UseVera Rubin, Lambros Comitas · Anchor Press/Doubleday · 1976 · chapter 2, pp. 16–17 · ISBN 0385121725
Checked. The date and the event were compared with a source that was read.