Steel-pan originates from low-income communities and was at first associated with violence and lawlessness. The upper class looked on steel-pan players with disdain until Dr. Eric Williams, leader of People's National Movement and the man known as father of the nation, increased the acceptance of steel-pan in the mainstream music scene by encouraging corporations to sponsor steel bands, giving the bands more respectability in society. Today, steel-pan is the national instrument of Trinidad and Tobago and is used worldwide. In 2013 Ancel Bhagwandeen was awarded by the Prime minister's Awards for Scientific Ingenuity for developing and producing the World's first tenor pan stick that is sound sensitive and displays light colours in sync with playing the steel pan. It is the first modernization of the pan stick in decades.