Gurdip Dev Bath – Special Representative of St Kitts and Nevis brought vaccine parity to the Caribbean region when the doses were extremely rare globally.
This move also enabled Dev Bath to become the recipient of the prestigious “The Honorary of the Republic” which is Barbados’ biggest state honour.
He received the prestigious award during a special ceremony hosted in Bridgetown on 26 June 2023.
With this, Bath was accorded the privilege of incorporating the honorary title “Sir” before his name. Since June 2023, Gurdip Dev Bath is now officially referred to as the “The Right Honourable”.
During the award ceremony hosted last year, Barbados President Dame Sandra Mason acknowledged his hard work during the days of hardship. She lauded him for helping Barbados, and sister islands in securing COVID-19 vaccines to kickstart their fight against the pandemic in 2022.
“I had discussions with the Prime Minister of Dominica Dr Roosevelt Skerrit, who asked me if I could speak to India about procuring vaccines. Then, I had discussions with the Indian counterparts at the time vaccine was like gold dust, but then I managed to speak to the Indian government, and they agreed to provide vaccines,” said Gurdip Bath while receiving the Honorary of the Republic.
He said that getting vaccines to Barbados, and other sister islands was a mission borne out of shared humanity.
Notably, the award was announced way back on November 30, 2022, but the official reception of the ceremony was hosted last year.
The event was attended by prestigious personalities, including President of Barbados Sandra Mason, Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottely and several other dignitaries, and government officials.
Furthermore, with this mission, Dev Bath’s roots from India came in handy and assisted in the success of the vaccine initiative.
Besides Dev Bath, popular Barbadian-American singer Rihanna was also conferred with the same award.
