Ram Narayan Deoki
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Ram Narayan (Ramsay) Deoki (1905 — 4 October 1964) was the first ordained Fiji Indian minister in the Methodist Church of Fiji and Rotuma.[1]
His father, Shiu Narayan Deoki, was initially a farmer in Navua but the decline in the sugar industry in the district forced him to move to Suva, where he set up a grocery business. In 1918, S. N. Deoki, together with 20 other members of his family converted to Christianity.
Education
At the age of twenty-one he was sent to Melbourne High School to study with students much younger than him. He also studied biblical studies at the Methodist Home Mission College in Kew, Melbourne. In 1926, his name was put forward to be trained as a minister but there was opposition from Caucasian ministers who feared[citation needed] that he would have to be paid the same rates as themselves as there was no provision for an Indian minister in a Church dominated in Fiji by Fijian ministers. He worked for several years as a local preacher and teacher before being accepted on probation in 1934.[clarification needed] He was finally ordained on 11 June 1939.