Toronto Star

Sometimes she is in the subway when someone pops the question. Other times she is in a fast food lineup. Once she was watching a movie in a theatre when a man came up and whispered: “Why do you wear a turban?”

Mandeep Kaur Uppal quickly took him outside and explained that she is a Sikh and wearing a turban is a part of her religion.

“I’m never annoyed because I want people to know why I wear it and how important it is for me.”

At a time when many young Sikh men are cutting their hair in a desperate bid to assimilate, Uppal, 28, is among a small but growing number of Sikh women in the Greater Toronto Area who wear the turban.

There are no numbers available, but local Sikh leaders estimate at least a few hundred women wear the turban. In fact, there are more women who wear the turban in North America than in Punjab, India, where the majority of Sikhism followers live.

“People are way more traditional here,” said Shaminder Singh, a Mississauga-based Sikh scholar. “They are worried about losing their religion and culture and so become more orthodox,” he said. “It’s a way for some people to protect their religion.”

Sikhism dates back to 15th-century India. Adherents are forbidden to cut their hair, considered a visible testament to connection with their creator. The turban was adopted to manage long hair and make Sikhs easily identifiable.

There are varying views on whether Sikh women are required to wear the turban. They are required to keep their hair but Singh says there is nothing in history that indicates they have to wear a turban, too.

Uppal says she wears the turban because “our gurus said all Sikhs should wear it, and that includes women.”

She didn’t always wear one.

Uppal was baptized about 15 years ago when she was a student at West Humber Collegiate Institute. For two years, she covered her head with a scarf but many mistook it for a hijab, the scarf worn by some Muslim women. That’s when she decided to wear a turban. “That’s my identity,” she said.

At first, it took her about half an hour to tie it up — now, she can do it in minutes, with her eyes closed.

The turban that Sikh women wear is rounded, not pointed like the ones worn by men. They come in a variety of colours and styles, including polka-dot and tie-dyed. Some places even sell ready-made turbans. But Uppal usually wears a black one. “It’s not about fashion . . . it’s about following my religion.”

Fashion is the last thing on the minds of turban-wearing women but they admit they “like standing out in a crowd… People always remember me,” said Preetinder Sehgal, a 20-year-old York University student who has worn a turban for eight years.

“I’m one of the handful of women on campus (who wear a turban),” she said. “And let’s be honest, I never have to worry about my hair . . . it’s always in place.”

Assimilation is always an issue for immigrants, said Sukhpreet Kaur, 28, who has worn a turban since she was a toddler. But the mother of two says integration is not about having to give up one’s identity or religion. “It’s about values — not about religion or how you dress up.”

Kaur’s son, Jasjot, 5, and daughter, Livleen, 3, also wear turbans.

When Livleen started playschool recently, one of the first questions she was asked was why she wears a turban. “I’ve told her that she’s a princess and wears a crown on her head. That’s what she should tell everyone.”

Kaur, whose family just moved from Windsor to Brampton, doesn’t think it’s too much to explain for a 3-year-old. “She likes wearing the turban and, believe me, kids are curious and ask questions. There’s never been any problem.”

One of her favourite stories about Livleen and her turban is from last year. The Ontario Khalsa Darbar, one of North America’s largest Sikh temples at Derry and Dixie Rds. in Mississauga, holds a turban-tying contest for young men every year.

Livleen wanted to participate but it was only for men. Her parent took her anyway and the feisty 3-year-old was given a special appreciation award. “She was very happy and I was really proud of her,” said Kaur.

Women who wear the turban face as much of a challenge as men do, said Pardeep Singh Nagra, manager of employment equity with the Toronto District School Board. Nagra visits schools to explain the significance of a turban and demonstrates how it is tied.

“Women are asked the same questions as men, and what I tell them is: Answer questions with a big smile and the best of your ability,” said Nagra, adding that the number of women who wear turbans is increasing.

“There are 100 per cent more women with turbans now than when I was in school,” he said. “That’s quite encouraging.”

As a Sikh Canadian, who was born in a Toronto suburb, roots for the Leafs, did law at the University of Ottawa, and works for a human rights organization, I’m astounded to hear claims from politicians that so-called “Sikh extremism” in on the rise.

If that’s the case, there’s no word of it among the more than 400,000 members of the Canadian Sikh community. The only thing we see on the rise is racism fuelled by these reckless comments.

As someone who wears the garb of his faith, I can tell you that the backlash we’re feeling is beginning to look like state-sanctioned vilification of Sikhs.

The evidence justifying this hate campaign is minimal. Most cite an offensive Facebook page attacking Vancouver MP Ujjal Dosanjh. I share his outrage and can understand his fear. Everyone knows Dosanjh’s personal history includes being beaten by thugs, and I sympathize with how that experience must have shaped his life.

But that doesn’t give him the right to turn Sikhs into the bogeyman. Or whip up hatred for a visible minority.

The other piece of Canadian evidence comes from 2007: a float in the Surrey, B.C. Vaisakhi parade displayed a picture of Talwinder Singh Parmar, who died in Indian police custody in 1992 and is widely believed to be one of the masterminds of the Air India bombing. What most people don’t know is that Parmar’s handful of supporters call him a martyr because they believe he is wrongly accused in the Air India tragedy. Some people, particularly of past generations, can’t believe anyone connected with the faith could be involved in a mass murder.

That makes them naive, not radical.

Perhaps the most persuasive piece of “evidence” comes from Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh who has been telling news media that Sikh extremism is on the rise for more than three years — although he offers little in the way of proof.

But his allegation is an effective tool for quashing legitimate discussion of India’s human rights abuses, which is the real purpose of India’s claim that the Sikh diaspora is harbouring “extremists,” particularly in England and Canada.

Both countries are known as champions of free speech and civil rights, which means human rights groups like the one I work for, the World Sikh Organization of Canada, can and do highlight abuses in foreign countries. That’s a problem for India as it seeks to rehabilitate its reputation and establish more trade in the West.

While India is a democracy — citizens vote — it lacks some critical liberal democratic values. The justice system is notoriously corrupt, there are few protections for minority groups, and the ruling government is just as likely to enforce its will with guns as parliamentary debate.

As Amnesty International’s 2010 report on human rights abuses details, Indian security forces continue to terrorize their own citizens. The report also notes India’s reluctance to prosecute those behind the 1984 massacre of more than 3,000 Sikhs that followed the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.

Canada has long been a leader in encouraging less developed countries to treat their citizens justly because oppressive regimes are ultimately unstable. That’s dangerous internationally and bad business for a trading nation like Canada.

So it’s shocking to hear Canadian politicians trying to erode our own free speech guarantees by labeling discussion as “extremism.”

Recently Dosanjh took a distinctly Indian point of view when he told the Toronto Sun that disagreeing with the authorities is a sign of a radical.

“(Extremism) is much more entrenched, much more sophisticated (than it was in 1985),” Dosanjh said, after the release of the Major Commission report on the Air India tragedy. “It is much more moderate in appearance than you might otherwise see. People run peaceful campaigns and behind the peaceful campaigns is the evil design to hurt other people and to dismember other countries.”

That’s an interesting view for a member of the Opposition to hold. Are we to assume that when the federal Liberal caucus campaigns against the Tory government they’re harbouring the urge to attack them with baseball bats?

We can trust they won’t because that’s not how we do it in Canada.

That the Sikh community has been linked to the Air India tragedy which took 331 innocent lives is a shame and sorrow the community will always bear.

But it’s also worth remembering that the Major Commission found that in the 1980s Canadian Sikhs informed the RCMP of terrorist activities — and were ignored.

Today, more than a generation later, even more Sikhs are Canadian-born and the community is fully integrated. To claim, “Sikh extremism is on the rise” without evidence is akin to linking Gilles Duceppe and the Bloc Québécois to 1970s FLQ terrorists.

To be blunt: Sikhs are a tight-knit community, if one of us was fomenting terrorism someone would have heard by now, and reported it.

But all we hear are accusations. And the warning to keep quiet about human rights abuses in India lest we be labeled “extremists.”

I plan to ignore that intimidation tactic. There is a long, proud tradition in Canada of encouraging foreign states to improve their human rights practices.

My organization will continue to stand up for Sikhs in oppressive states, just as we will continue speaking up for our fellow Canadians when their right to don a kilt or a hijab or build a succah hut is denied.

Despite what foreign politicians are saying, there is no evidence of Sikh extremism and Canadian Sikhs are much like the rest of the country: We don’t believe in violence (except at hockey games).

Balpreet Singh Boparai is legal counsel for the World Sikh Organization of Canada, a human rights organization that recently championed an Alberta teenager’s right to wear a kilt to graduation.

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

It was the worst day of my entire life. A terrible day. I was crushed. A friend of the family (Punjabi film actor Virender; a cousin of Bollywood’s Dharmendra) first informed me of the disaster. “Which flight was bhaaji on?” he asked me and his face became ashen the moment I said “182.” I knew something terrible had happened. As the wife of a pilot, I knew only too well what a midair explosion meant. Everyone onboard the Kanishka was killed. Killed instantly. Killed without mercy. All I remember saying at the time was: ‘I am finished!’”
We had no inkling about any terrorist threat to the Air India aircraft. Actually Sat and I never really discussed the possibility. In fact, flight 182 would have been his last as co-pilot. It was to qualify him as commander (first pilot) on the transatlantic route.

He was keen that I accompany him because there was a full week between landing and take-off from Toronto. “It will be a paid holiday,” he said. But I refused and that made him very unhappy. Something was telling me to stay back for the children. My heart began sinking the moment he asked me to come.

Sat left us on June 13 and that was the last time we saw him alive.

Call it a premonition of some sort, but I had always been very scared when my husband went on a flight. I constantly tracked his movement… I always knew where and what part of the world he was flying over at any given time. My sixth sense was always alert.

But one is always forced to give in to destiny. Now, both my son and son-in-law are commercial pilots. Ashamdeep had his heart set on becoming a pilot just like his father. I never encouraged him but also did not have it in me to stand in his way.
Ours was a different kind of love story. We were married in the winter (December) of 1970. Our families had known each other long and we met at weddings and family functions. And even though we never spoke about it, both of us knew we were meant to be to-gether. When he first proposed, my father, who had his own fears because Sat was in the Air Force and flying an obsolete Super Constellation aircraft, was reluctant. But eventually everyone agreed it was a good match.
Sat was very handsome and looked amazing in his IAF uniform. He used to lovingly call me “Ambee”, which is Punjabi for a raw mango.

Our marriage was like a dream. Immediately after the wedding, he was posted to Shillong and we drove there all the way from Delhi. It took us all of 10 days and we stopped at the Taj Mahal because he insisted we must seek blessings at the greatest shrine of love.

When the war broke out in 1971, Sat rejoined his old Super Constellation squadron at Pune to carry out maritime reconnaissance over the Arabian Sea. He would go out on nightly sorties and I stayed up till he returned each morning.
My husband never spoke about any safety issues during his flying for the Air Force. Though there was always shoptalk in the officers’ mess about how he had brought back the aircraft on a single engine… I did not understand the implications fully but became scared easily as a young wife. Sat always said: “Darling don’t you worry… nothing will ever happen.” That was his favourite line.

We were very happy in the Air Force but it didn’t give him much chance to realise his great desire for the children to travel and see the world. “Travelling, seeing and experiencing new places and people is the best possible education,” he would often say. That was the only reason he chose to join Air India because we could have never done it on an IAF salary.
After we lost Sat, I saved and scrounged to ensure that both kids got a vacation abroad each summer. It was like religion to me… a tribute to the father of my children.

It was very tough after we lost him. I was a protected, young housewife with two little children and money suddenly became a major issue because his salary was our only source of income. I realised soon that I would have to pick up the threads and start all over again. Air India gave me a job at Chandigarh and was generous enough to let me stay here until my children were grown up.

I have never been able to open my mind to anyone after Sat. We had an amazing relationship. I cannot imagine a better partner and marriage. We lived for each other and in a sense I still do. I have met many nice people but it never occurred to me that I could or needed to begin a new relationship.

I kept myself busy fulfilling his dreams and doing all that he would have been happy to see me doing. Sat remains my guiding light and I believe he is still watching us. I was a most pampered housewife and without his (invisible) hand on my shoulder none of this would have been possible.

Life goes on but the trauma is unending. Justice for the victims of Flight 182 has been unacceptably delayed. They have kept our pain alive for the past 25 years and have still not been able to identify and punish the real culprits.
The only satisfaction is that the Canadian Government has now officially acknowledged what we had known in bits and pieces from media reports and people. The John Major Commission has accepted that the threat to Air India was taken very lightly. I personally appreciate Justice Major for having the courage and honesty to bring all these bitter facts on record. But like I said, the culprits have not been, and will probably never be given adequate punishment. And that is the painful bit.
I still cannot understand the minds of the men who planned and executed the bombing — 329 innocent people died that day and thousands of others have been suffering since. This was done in the name of Sikh extremism but I fail to understand this brand of Sikhism. Both my husband and I were proud to be Sikhs but this is definitely not the Sikhism we were brought up to practice. I refuse to believe there is any difference between a Sikh and a Hindu or a person of any other religious belief. They were all innocents aboard the Kanishka that fateful day.

The men who did this were criminals and madmen. The Khalistanis called themselves freedom fighters but why then were they out there in Canada? They were nothing but cowards sitting in safe havens and terrorising us here. All they eventually achieved was that the rest of the world began hating and suspecting all Sikhs!
As told to Asit Jolly

Brendan Kennedy

Toronto Star

Home Depot Canada and one of its senior employees discriminated against a Sikh security guard by “selectively enforcing” a hard hat rule and threatening to fire him for not removing his turban, Ontario’s Human Rights Tribunal has ruled.

The company and assistant manager Brian Busch also subjected Deepinder Loomba to “discriminatory treatment in the form of rude and offensive comments and conduct” based on his Sikh religion, tribunal vice-chair Ena Chadha wrote in her decision.

“I am satisfied that the complainant was treated differently because of his turban and that this was negative differential treatment,” Chadha wrote.

On Dec. 6, 2005, Loomba, who worked for Reilly’s Security Services, showed up for his morning shift at a Milton Home Depot. The store was six weeks from opening and some areas were still under construction.

Loomba testified at the tribunal that Busch told him he had to put on a hard hat, despite the fact his role was to sit at a desk away from construction zones. He said people were moving around the site without hard hats.

Loomba testified that when he did not comply, Busch was rude to him and later mocked him with a group of workers at the site. After he left the facility, he said Busch approached him and told him that individuals before him had been fired for not complying in a similar fashion.

Busch denied making fun of Loomba and said he never threatened to fire him.

The case was brought before the tribunal after Home Depot failed to respond to complaints.

Chadha wrote that she found Loomba’s testimony more credible than Busch’s, which she said included “numerous discrepancies . . . which could not be logically reconciled with the undisputed facts.”

After the decision was released Loomba said he felt like “the winner.”

“It wasn’t a fight of fundamentalism, it was a fight of principles,” he said.

Loomba, who is originally from Uganda, said Busch’s and Home Depot’s actions challenged his way of life.

“A turban for a Sikh is a part of his body,” he said. “It is not acceptable, we are all human beings and we are living in a multicultural society.”

Though Reilly’s opted not to support Loomba in his complaint — “choosing to favour its corporate client in Home Depot,” Loomba’s lawyer, Raj Anand said — Loomba remains employed by the security company.

Chadha has not decided on a remedy for the case (Loomba is seeking around $25,000 and changes to Home Depot’s policies) and she still must determine if the Occupational Health and Safety Act, which requires hard hats to be worn at construction sites, is itself in conflict with Ontario’s Human Rights Code.

A representative of Home Depot Canada could not immediately be reached for comment.

A reenactment of the case U.S. vs. Bhagat Singh Thind (1923) where Thind, an Asian-Indian was denied citizenship due to not being a “free, white man” is occurring on Saturday June 26, 2010 at 2:15 P.M. at the Harvard school of Law. If you are interested in attending or acquiring more information regarding this issue, please visit the Institute for Race and Justice webpage. On this day, a grave injustice will be put to rest, where the outcome of the trial will go differently and Thind will be granted U.S. citizenship. Sadly, Bhagat S. Thind passed away in 1967 so he will not be able to witness this event. However, this will be a very auspicious occasion for his family, Asian Indians, and Sikhs.

Bhagat Singh Thind, b. 1892 was a Punjabi Sikh man who originally (and legally) immigrated to the U.S. in 1913 from India to obtain higher education. He inevitably acquired his Ph.D and taught lessons in metaphysics; Dr. Thind was inspired by different religious scriptures as well as Emmerson, Whitman, and Thoreau. He was also recruited by the U.S. government to serve in the military during World War I in 1918. Dr. Thind initially applied for citizenship in the state of Washington after he was honorably discharged from the military. Thind’s request was granted, however his citizenship was was revoked four days later on the basis that he was not a “white” man. How is it fair that a man was considered fit enough to fight in a war for the United States, but was not “white” enough to be considered a citizen? Sounds hypocritical and unfortunate to me.

Thind’s initial revocation of citizenship did not leave him discouraged or disheartened–he decided to try again. Six months later, Dr. Thind again applied for citizenship–this time in Oregon. This time, Thind’s request for citizenship was approved, however, the Immigration and Naturalization Service appealed the judge’s decision and took the case to the Supreme Court. Here, the Supreme Court unanimously decided to repeal Thind’s citizenship on the basis that he was again, not a “free, white man.” Thind argued that Asian Indians were Caucasian and were descended from Aryans. However, the Supreme Court disregarded this argument because Thind was not a “white” Caucasian man; here, they decreed that Caucasian and “white” were not synonymous as many of us believe nowdays. Therefore, Dr. Thind’s citizenship was revoked AGAIN for the second time.

More than a decade later, in 1935 a law was passed where all World War I Veterans were granted citizenship. Due to this stipulation, Bhagat Singh Thind finally qualified to be a U.S. citizen. Dr. Thind was finally able to gain status as a U.S. citizen due to his World War I Veteran qualification.

Dr. Bhagat Singh Thind was married to Mrs. Vivian Thind and is survived by his children David and Rosalind. His occupation and passion was lecturing on: religion, spirituality, and philosophy (among many other things). He wrote a number of works that delineated his philosophy. More information on Dr. Thind’s life can be found on his website.

As a Sikh, Asian Indian, AND American, the reenactment of Dr. Bhagat Singh Thind’s case will be a very important to me. On this day, a strong and brave man will be recognized, and a moral wrong, rectified.

Below is an image of Dr. Thind taken from his website:

(Speech delivered by Manoj Mitta on June 3, 2010 in the Canadian Parliament at an annual dinner meeting on human rights.)

Friends, I am honored by this opportunity to speak to such a distinguished audience, including so many MPs and diplomats. I am also honored to be speaking at this historic venue of the Canadian Parliament. Since my visit to Canada comes close on the heels of a controversy over the denial of visas to security personnel from India, I cannot help starting my address with a reference to it. This unforeseen controversy had served to highlight the seamy side of the Indian democracy. It was a rare opportunity to internationalize a major and long standing issue of impunity: the appalling record of excesses committed by Indian security personnel, especially in the many conflict affected areas of India. As a journalist tracking legal and human rights issues, as an independent observer of the Indian state’s record in these areas, I was delighted to discover the civilizing potential of your rules forbidding entry to those involved in attacks on civilians or terrorism, systematic or gross human rights violations or genocide. I was hoping that the enforcement of such rules by more advanced democracies like Canada would shame the Indian state into adopting methods that are more compliant with international standards of acceptable behavior for security forces.

I was therefore deeply disappointed to see that, far from standing by its officials for upholding human rights, the Steve Harper government buckled under the Manmohan Singh government’s pressure. The implication of immigration minister Jason Kenney’s apology is that Canada has allowed its economic interests to yield to its commitment to human rights. It’s a pity that the Harper administration seemed to have been taken in by the suggestion that security personnel were beyond criticism because they were discharging a sovereign function. Had the George Bush administration gone by such logic, it would not have denied visa to Narendra Modi for his alleged complicity in the massacre of Muslims in Gujarat in 2002. After all, it is arguable that, as a democratically elected chief minister of Gujarat and a Constitution office holder, Modi was entitled to greater deference from the US than the security personnel who had been denied visas by Canada. In retrospect, the much maligned Bush administration proved firmer than the Harper administration in its adherence to human rights.

Having observed the conduct of security forces in India over two and half decades, I can vouch that the concerns raised by Canadian immigration officers while denying visas to security personnel are not misplaced. In fact, since I owe this invitation to a book I co-authored on the 1984 massacre of Sikhs in Delhi, I can say with a degree of authority that the carnage could not have taken place without the complicity of the police and Army personnel. And I am not saying this merely on the basis of my own investigations. Official inquiries too have admitted that there was pattern to the dereliction of duty displayed by security personnel across the nation’s capital: they either looked the other way when armed mobs attacked Sikhs or they aided and abetted the miscreants by disarming the victims. And what happened in 1984 was by no means an isolated instance of excesses committed by security personnel at the instance of the powers that be. The instances cited by your immigration officials of Kashmir and Indo-Bangladesh border relate to chronically disturbed areas, which are notoriously prone to abuses by security personnel. A group of women in the North East not so long ago stripped themselves naked in a dramatic attempt to convey the extent of atrocities suffered by them at the hands of armed forces.

As an independent journalist, I cannot help expressing disappointment at your government’s retraction on the visa issue. If you instead had somebody from the Indian high commission addressing you now, he would of course have commended the Harper administration for the sense of responsibility displayed by it. He would also have harped on those rhetorical claims about India being the world’s largest democracy. And since economic ties are the driving force, he would even have mouthed the tourism department’s catch phrase: Incredible India. But that is one expression on which I would find myself in agreement with the Indian government’s perception. India is indeed incredible – though not necessarily in the feel-good sense in which the tourism department uses that phrase. There are many incredible ways in which India commits human rights violations on its citizens and can be blasé about them. Let me cite a few examples from my own area of research, the 1984 carnage.

1. Can you imagine 3,000 people being massacred in three days in the capital of any other country that claims to be a liberal democracy? That is exactly what happened in New Delhi in 1984 when about that many Sikhs were officially admitted to have been killed in the wake of the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.

2. Yet, all the people who were arrested or detained during those three fateful days in 1984 were Sikhs themselves. It was a pincer attack on Sikhs: If rioters didn’t get them, cops would.

3. Within a fortnight of the massacre, Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, rather than expressing remorse, justified the mass killings by saying that when a big tree falls, the earth is bound to shake. Can you imagine the leader of any other democracy getting away with such callousness?

4. In keeping with his policy of brazening out the massacre, Rajiv Gandhi stonewalled all demands for an inquiry for several months. His incredible excuse for not wanting to find out the truth was that it would reopen old wounds.

5. When he finally ordered the inquiry six months later, all the proceedings was held in camera and the media was barred from reporting anything about them. Yes, the media, succumbing to nationalist fervor, tamely obeyed the gag order although it had no sanction in law.

6. The report that came out of such a secretive inquiry turned out to be so completely lacking in credence that the Rajiv Gandhi government did not allow any discussion on it in Parliament.

7. When the first ever debate on the 1984 massacre finally took place in 2005, i.e. after 21 long years, it was thanks to a fresh inquiry ordered by the government run by another political party.

8. The government headed by a Sikh, Manmohan Singh, rejected the report of the fresh inquiry which had for the first time in 2005 confirmed the complicity of Congress party leaders such as H K L Bhagat, Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar.

9. The outrage in the media and civil society over the rejection of the inquiry report’s findings forced the government two days later to take a U turn and promise criminal action against indicted leaders. Though this promise was made in 2005, no leader has so far been convicted.

10. One symbolic gain the victims however made in 2005 was that the government for the first time in 21 years apologized in Parliament for the massacre. That was the least Manmohan Singh could do after having originally rejected the findings of the fresh inquiry.

11. Last November, on the 25th anniversary of the massacre, the government remembered only Indira Gandhi’s assassination. Despite having a Sikh Prime Minister, it could not get itself to make even a token gesture to commemorate the massacre.

The reason I went into these incredible details about the 1984 massacre is to give you a sense of how that episode in our history has become a benchmark of impunity. Nobody can be faulted for believing that if India had rendered justice to the victims of 1984, it would have perhaps been spared the trauma of further sectarian violence in 1992, 2002 and 2008. The casualties of these subsequent events were largely Muslims and Christians, a fact underlying the common interest that lies in grappling with this monster of impunity.

Since I began my address my urging the Canadian government to keep up the pressure on India on human rights, I would like to end by making a similar appeal to Sikhs living in Canada. Your interest in the human rights situation in India will not seen by civil society as an unwarranted interference. On the contrary, we welcome any interaction that helps India raise its standards in this globalised world, not only in economic terms but also in civilisational terms. Your vigilance might also have a salutary effect on elements within the Sikh community who have been subverting the cause of justice. So, do keep up your engagement with human rights across the world. Thank you.

World Sikh Organization of Canada

In the international uproar over a Canadian immigration officer who denied a visa to a former member of a “notoriously violent” Indian paramilitary force one thing is clear: Some Canadian politicians are working for everyone but Canadians.

The story broke in India two weeks ago after a would-be immigrant complained that an unnamed visa officer declined his application on the grounds that he had worked with the Border Security Force, a paramilitary group. The rejection letter noted that the BSF had been involved in attacks on civilians and had engaged in “systematic torture.” Soon other rejected applicants came forward complaining that they, too, were banned under a rule that forbids entry to war criminals or anyone who has engaged in “terrorism, systematic or gross human rights violations, or genocide.”

Instead of commending the visa officer for doing the job Canadians expect — excluding those who ignore Canadian human rights standards — Immigration Minister Jason Kenney opted to offer India a grovelling apology. (The Tories have been courting India’s market of more than 1 billion people as a trading partner.)

Visa officers have “too much latitude,” Kenney told several news outlets.

I suspect most Canadians would say that it is Kenny who has been given too much latitude. This is a point that voters might take up with the opposition if it weren’t for the fact that Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh told the Hindustan Times that India’s anger is justified.

Dosanjh compares India to two other nations known for human rights abuses, China and Israel. He suggests that India is entitled to the same low standards of scrutiny on immigrants that Canada has (supposedly) granted them.

“Will they dare do this to the Chinese or Israelis? Never. I am very angry about how the Canadian government is treating individual members of Indian security agencies,” Dosanjh is quoted as saying. “Indian security agencies may have the same kind of operational difficulties that Israeli forces are going through in the Middle East. But Canadians dare not treat Israeli agencies the way they are treating Indian agencies.”

If that’s true, what makes Dosanjh think it’s in the best interests of Canadians to lower the standard of scrutiny for Indian immigrants rather than raise it for those from China or Israel?

While Kenney and Dosanjh both show a touching enthusiasm for maintaining the good name of India’s security forces, it’s a shame they don’t show more concern for the welfare of the Canadians who elected them.

Amnesty International’s 2010 report notes that Indian police and paramilitary forces engage in the torture, abduction and killing of civilians as well as harassing human rights defenders reporting on their actions. (This same report highlights the Canadian government’s poor treatment of aboriginals, which may be why Kenney prefers to ignore it.)

The Toronto Star has reported that Meenakshi Ganguly, a researcher with Human Rights Watch, was not surprised by the Canadian immigration officer’s assessment of the Border Security Force. Human Rights Watch’s reports show that the BSF has committed human rights violations both in the Indian-administered Kashmir and along the India-Bangladesh border.

But then those are just the views of “some ridiculous human rights activist body,” as the New Delhi Sunday Pioneer characterizes critics. It dismisses Canada’s immigration officers as being “preachy moralists” who don’t understand “the complexities of a country.”

“Since there are no accepted global yardsticks, Canada has set up its own war crimes section where, presumably, gullible, starry-eyed youngsters, fresh from university and an internship with some ridiculous human rights activist body, sit in judgment over the Indian army,” writes the Sunday Pioneer.

That article brags that India only rejects visa applicants on reasonable grounds, citing the barring of Salman Rushdie, whose book The Satanic Verses earned him death threats from Muslims. “Where Canada differs is by statutorily barring all those it considers guilty or complicit of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.”

Yes, author Swapan Dasgupta does seem to have it right. Unlike India, Canada protects freedom of speech and human rights. And most Canadians consider it perfectly reasonable to expect that immigrants share those values.

Or so I thought until I read of the disgraceful performances by Kenney and Dosanjh.

I think that it’s fair to say that India defines the word democracy differently than Canada — which is its right. But Kenney and Dosanjh were elected to represent Canadian views and values, not Indian ones.

Gian Singh Sandhu is the founding president of the World Sikh Organization of Canada and currently serves as senior policy adviser to the group. He is a member of the Order of British Columbia and has served as CEO and president of a major forest company in British Columbia.

MAY 27, 2010

A 19-year-old Raymond, Alta., student is excited he’ll be able to wear a kilt to his graduation ceremony after all.

“I’m happy . . . just so full of energy. I just don’t know how to describe it,” Hamish Jacobs said Wednesday after learning Westwind School Division trustees had decided to back away from a policy that forbade him from baring his legs.

He’ll now be able to sport the formal wear of his Scottish ancestors when he accepts his high school diploma in June.

The policy requires all male students to wear dress pants and shoes under their gowns, which ruled out the kilt.

School board chairman Lance Miller said trustees are still scheduled to review the policy Tuesday at their next board meeting, but decided to act sooner to quell the controversy.

“Obviously it was a policy that needed to be revisited,” said Miller. “But like I said, there was too much public outcry to wait until the policy could be formally reviewed.”

He conducted a straw poll with trustees Wednesday and found they were in favour of bending the rules, he said.

Miller felt the saga was blown out of proportion, but Jacobs disagreed: “This is something big in my life.”
Support for Jacobs, an aspiring automotive technician who works part-time as a pizzeria supervisor, came from many quarters, including a Facebook page that attracted close to 2,400 members.

And on Wednesday, the World Sikh Organization of Canada announced it had sent a letter to the Westwind School Division in support of Jacobs. The group said it saw in his story some similarities with Sikh struggles to maintain symbols of their cultural roots.

Miller noted that even without the rule reversal, Jacobs would have been able to wear his kilt to other graduation events.

Raymond is southeast of Lethbridge.

© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald

Manoj Mitta, TOI Crest, May 8, 2010, 10.55am IST

Three months ago we celebrated 60 years of the Indian Republic with much fanfare. Now, pause for thought. Consider the different incidents that have hit the headlines since, which force us to ponder about the status of the liberal values bequeathed by our founding fathers. How much has our caste-ridden society, which continues to be marked by a feudal mindset and patriarchy, internalised the most fundamental of all liberal values — of equality and liberty?

Recall the challenge thrown last week to the Constitution by a congregation of caste bodies in Haryana called khap panchayats. Denouncing the punishment meted out for an instance of ‘honour killing’ , khap panchayats demanded that the law be amended to ban marriage between Hindus of the same gotra (sub-caste ), and within the same village . As the political class baulked at taking on these Taliban-like forces, the trial judge who had dared to award death penalty to five persons and life sentence to one for the double murder of a newly married couple sought a transfer, saying she feared for her life.

In another marriage-related controversy, the Supreme Court rescued actress Khushboo from being harassed by a string of obscenity and defamation cases that had been initiated against her two years ago in farflung places for her candid observation in the media that pre-marital sex had caught on in Tamil Nadu. The judgment, quashing all criminal proceedings against Khushboo, however came shortly after another celebrity, painter M F Husain — hounded similarly by self-appointed guardians of ‘Indian culture’ — had given up Indian citizenship out of sheer despair.

If the Khushboo and Husain cases exposed the fragility of our freedom of speech and expression , the phone tapping controversy, which rocked the current session of Parliament , brought home the extent to which our privacy has been invaded or imperilled by state agencies. This came close on the heels of other privacy-related concerns raised by the Centre’s initiatives to track and tail us through UID numbers, NATGRID and a DNA data bank.

Meanwhile, the IPL scandal gripped the country. The bust-up brought many issues into relief, not least the policy anomaly of persisting with the 1867-vintage ban on gambling. While this ban is enforced strictly against betting in cricket, the Supreme Court upheld the exception made in the case of horse racing. For all the reforms BCCI claims to have initiated post-Lalit Modi, the government, hampered by sanctimonious considerations that confuse betting with match fixing, has shown no sign of doing away with this archaic prohibition.

The latest reason for reflecting on our liberal values was provided this week by the Supreme Court’s long-overdue decision to invalidate narco-analysis , brain mapping and polygraph tests on suspects. Given the expressly spelt-out fundamental right against self-incrimination , there should never have been any doubt about the impermissibility of these scientifically dubious and coercive techniques to bring out the ‘truth’ . Yet, it was only after narco-analysis had been applied extensively in a slew of high-profile cases , that too with judicial blessings, that the apex court finally woke up to the illegality, although it had completed hearing the matter over two years ago.

That the truth serum can no longer be administered without the consent of the suspect places India, in this respect, among the ranks of liberal democracies. From a liberal perspective, the effect of the Supreme Court judgment on narco-analysis is almost as significant as the Delhi high court’s decision last year to decriminalise homosexuality. These judicial breakthroughs are comparable to the landmark legislation on RTI, which has added a new dimension to the free speech guarantee in the Constitution.

Despite such incremental advances, and even after almost two decades of the muchtouted market liberalisation, India is nowhere near global liberal democracy standards . Although there has been some movement in the right direction, liberalism seems to be lagging behind liberalisation, which has more resourceful votaries. The dismantling of the socialist infrastructure was expected to enhance individual freedoms, but there has been little evidence of any such automatic fallout. The dichotomy between ‘India’ and ‘Bharat’ exists as much in the political context of liberalism as it does in the economic context of liberalisation.

While ‘India’ is widely acknowledged as a rising economic power, ‘Bharat’ has the dubious distinction of being home to the largest population of the world’s poor. Similarly, from a liberal viewpoint, even as ‘India’ developed Gurgaon into a metaphor for stateof-the-art corporate complexes and international-standard recreational retreats, not too far away ‘Bharat’ bears the stigma of a village called Mirchpur where, last month, a khap panchayat supported a caste atrocity in which two Dalits were killed and the houses of several more of that community were gutted under the benign gaze of the police and administration.

There can also be a clash between liberalism and liberalisation, as evident from the contrasting reactions to Narendra Modi. Some captains of industry, who are champions of liberalisation, famously hailed him as a future prime minister, impressed as they were by the economic development Gujarat has witnessed under his stewardship. But for liberals, however good an administrator he might be, Modi’s alleged complicity in the post-Godhra riots is enough to render him unfit to remain chief minister, let alone his elevation to higher office.

In his book, The Rise of Illiberal Democracy , Fareed Zakaria cited the Gujarat experience to argue that India might have the credentials to be called a democracy but did not fulfil the criteria to be classified a liberal democracy. Here are some challenges India will have to take head-on to make the cut.