Exhibition pays homage to Canadian Sikh soldiers
Thursday, 22/01/2015
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VANCOUVER: An Abbotsford museum in British Columbia has launched a year-long exhibition on the “often overlooked” stories of the only 10 known Canadian Sikh soldiers who served during World War 1.
‘Canadian Sikhs in World War 1 – The Forgotten Story’ opened at the Sikh Heritage Museum at Abbotsford’s Gur Sikh Temple national historic site on Sunday.
According to Satwinder Bains, the director of UFV’s Centre for Indo-Canadian Studies, the exhibition explores the role of each individual Sikh soldier with the use of narratives and stories.
“Perhaps by looking at the individual soldier, we can gain an understanding of the immense sacrifice,” Bains said in a statement. “The time period of the war, from 1914-1918, was a period of intense racial strife in Canadian history. Indians, along with other ‘coloured’ people, were simply not welcome in Canada as participating citizens.”
“The fact that these Sikh soldiers even served for Canada in the Great War begs historic recognition,” Bains added.
Incidents such as the 1907 Anti-Asian Riots led by the then mayor of Vancouver, the disenfranchisement of Indians in 1907, the ‘continuous journey’ regulation of 1910, or the turning away of the Komagata Maru ship in 1914 are some of the examples that demonstrate the ways in which racism was institutionalised within the Canadian ethos at the time, Bains notes. “Despite facing such immense and intense discrimination, soldiers such as Bukham Singh, Harnam Singh, Lashman Singh, John Baboo, etc., decided that they still wanted to serve the country that refused to accept them as full citizens and denied them the right to vote,” says Sharanjit Sandhra, coordinator of the Centre for Indo-Canadian Studies.
The exhibition will remain open for the year.
