I am a softie despite my military background: Canada’s Sikh minister
Saturday, 14/11/2015
http://paper.hindustantimes.com/epaper/viewer.aspx
TORONTO: Canada’s newlyappointed Sikh defence minister Harjit Sajjan said he is not a “badass” and is “quite a softie” despite his military background.
Sajjan (45), who immigrated to Canada from India when he was a boy, said the country must contribute to the defeat of the Islamic State (IS) but rejected the idea that Canadians should be afraid of the jihadist organisation.
“ISIS is a threat and there’s no doubt about that. Should we fear it? No. The Canadian population should have full confidence in all the security services to keep us safe,” he told CBC News.
Sajjan is a decorated military veteran who has served in Afghanistan and Bosnia besides working as a detective in the Vancouver Police Service.
Sajjan leapfrogged his former mentor, retired general Andrew Leslie, to get the nod as defence minister in Justin Trudeau’s cabinet. And his appointment to the cabinet went viral on the social media — with a picture from his days in Afghanistan tweeted with the line “Canada’s new minister of defence is badass.”
Asked what he thinks of being dubbed as a “badass”, Sajjan said, “I actually chuckled. I was really shocked at the interest in me, because when I got the job I was like, ‘(this is) a big responsibility, I can’t mess this up’.”
“I have done a lot of interesting things in the Vancouver police and in the military, where I would say that I worked with some very professional soldiers and police officers. But my kids, my little daughter, can say something to me and almost put me to tears,” he said.
