People

Canada’s Sikh-Canadian Ministers Have Raised The Bar In Politics

INDRANI BASU

The Sikh-Canadian community is strong and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has his share of men and women from the community that he really depends on.

Last year, a video showing the PM shaking a leg (and shoulders) to Punjabi pop music went viral.

And recently in Washington, DC, during a state visit to the US, he shamed his counterparts in India by pointing out that he had more Sikhs in his cabinet -- and members of parliament! -- than even Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi does (the latter has two).

Trudeau's cabinet is certainly more diverse than it has ever been -- it has an equal number of men and women (15 each, excluding the PM), and there are four Sikh and two aboriginal ministers.

These Sikh ministers in Trudeau's cabinet have fascinating back stories. Here's a look at the Sikh brigade in Canada's federal cabinet (alphabetically).


NAVDEEP SINGH BAINS

This Canada-born 38-year-old is a second-generation immigrant with an MBA in finance. Navdeep started with a bang in the Canadian political scene when he got elected to the Canadian Parliament in 2004 -- all of 26 years -- as the youngest Liberal MP, representing the district of Mississauga-Brampton South in Ontario. He is the Minister for Innovation, Science and Economic Development.

He is known to have been, inter alia, a pioneer in Canadian politics in his vocal support of same-sex marriages.

Navdeep, who has two daughters, is also a distinguished visiting professor at Ryerson University's Ted Rogers School of Management.


BARDISH KAUR CHAGGER

Though Bardish -- as Canada’s Minister for Tourism & Small Industries -- is the youngest of the Sikh ministers in the cabinet, her association with Canadian politics is perhaps the oldest.

She was only 13 years old when she volunteered for Liberal politician Andrew Telegdi's successful campaign in Waterloo. Even though she graduated with a science degree and planned to become a nurse, political life beckoned her. She worked with Telegdi, eventually becoming his executive assistant, and volunteered for Justin Trudeau's 2013 party leadership bid.

Interestingly, when she won the Waterloo riding last October, the 35-year-old defeated incumbent Conservative MP Peter Braid, who had ousted her former boss, Telegdi.


HARJIT SINGH SAJJAN

Canada's Defence Minister went to school with one of the most notorious gangsters -- Bindy Johal -- in British Columbia. While Johal was shot dead in a Vancouver night club in 1998, Harjit went on to serve in the Canadian army and Vancouver police force where he put drug traffickers like Johal behind bars. How did these two Canadians, both excellent students, grow up together to be so different?

"His mentors were the wrong mentors," 45-year-old Harjit said in an interview last year.

Among Harjit's many achievements is his patent on a gas mask that can be used while wearing a turban. Harjit has clearly come a long way from his berry-picking days when he would help his immigrant mother add to the family's income during the summer


AMARJEET SINGH SOHI

The 52-year-old Punjab-born Infrastructure Minister's story is an immigrant's dream. He was 17 years old when his elder brother sponsored his move to Canada. When he entered the country, he spoke very little English, but managed to take language classes and pass high school.

Amarjeet's ascendancy in politics was more gradual than Navdeep’s. He won a Council seat in his second attempt in 2007 and completed two terms. He did not run for mayor in 2013 despite being widely expected to do so, and in 2015 was acclaimed as the Liberal candidate for Parliament in the newly created Edmonton Mill Woods riding in Alberta.

Even with Amarjeet’s serious background as a political prisoner in India (where he was tortured during a period when innocent Sikh youth were being killed in the thousands by government authorities) and engagement in Punjabi theatre in Canada, he has a light side. He confessed once to have worn pink shoes to school "without knowing that, in Canada, pink was a girl's colour."


[Courtesy: The Huffington Post. Edited for sikhchic.com]
March 16, 2016
 

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