The Indian freedom fighter who ended his career as a captain on ‘Star Trek’

Reginald Lal Singh’s most memorable screen appearance came at the very end of his acting career. In 1967, he played Captain Chandra in Court Martial, an episode of the original Star Trek series. It was a fittingly unusual final role for a man whose life had already seen adventures that rivalled the fictional worlds of Hollywood.

From the early 1950s onward, Singh appeared in a succession of Hollywood productions, usually in minor roles. He was also employed as a “technical” consultant whenever studios sought “authentic” information about the “Orient”. Yet acting was only one chapter in an eventful life that had taken him from the jungles of South America to the Indian freedom movement, from wartime rescue efforts in the Atlantic to political activism in the United States.

Much of Singh’s remarkable story survives through his memoirs, preserved in the New York Public Library, and through accounts written by his wife, Gwen, whose papers are held in the archives of the University of California, Los Angeles.

Amazonian childhood

Born in British Guiana (now Guyana) on August 8, 1905, Reginald Augustus Babulal Singh was usually known simply as Lal. His father, Baboolal, was from Kanpur and his mother, Lakshmi, was from Saharanpur. They had emigrated as indentured labourers to Demerara in the 1890s...

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