As a city of tents sprang up outside India’s capital city New Delhi in December 2020, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau waded into a debate around protests taking place halfway across the world.
From Ottawa, he promised that Canada would “always stand up” for the right to peacefully protest.
Hardeep Singh Nijjar murder: Canadian allies hesitant in response over India tensions
“We believe in the importance of dialogue and that’s why we have reached out through multiple means directly to the Indian authorities to highlight our concerns,” he said.
Trudeau was responding to concerns among Canada’s significant Sikh diaspora that the Indian government was cracking down on farmers protesting a new agricultural policy. His comments were met with a sharp reaction from India, where the government summoned the Canadian ambassador over the issue.
This diplomatic spat made headlines, and was just one example of how the effects of domestic politics and policies in India are spurring frustrations, fear and what one expert called “mounting tensions” among members of the diaspora communities in Canada.
And in the days since Trudeau rose in the House of Commons saying Canadian authorities are investigating “potential links” between agents of the Indian government and the murder of Canadian Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar, there has been renewed focus on the challenges of negotiating an evolving relationship with India.
In particular, how should Canada navigate ties with an aspiring global superpower in the years since the Indian farmers’ movement galvanized the diaspora?
‘Mounting tensions’ within Indian diaspora
In 2020 and 2021, Indian farmers, mostly led by Sikh farmers from the northern state of Punjab, camped outside of New Delhi for over a year. They were demanding the repeal of a series of laws they said gave greater control to giant corporations over farming.
Meanwhile, thousands of people took part in solidarity marches in Canadian cities.
Major cities like Toronto and Vancouver saw members of the Sikh diaspora leading protests, with an indefinite sit-in outside the Indian high commission. Canadian politicians from Trudeau and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh to then-Conservative leader Erin O’Toole expressed solidarity with protesters.
“I think diaspora communities have always cared about politics at home,” said Sanjay Ruparelia, Jarislowsky Democracy Chair at Toronto Metropolitan University.
The Indian diaspora in Canada has been divided, between those who are ardent supporters of India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and those who oppose him.
“Many would describe him (Modi) as a polarizing figure,” Ruparelia said. “Those who support him support him avidly. They champion him and think of him as the greatest leader post-independence India has had. Those who oppose him oppose both his government, his actions, but also the ideology of the Hindu Nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).”
Those divisions in India, particularly along religious lines, have made their way into the diaspora.
“Members of the Sikh community say that the divisive politics is what they have been confronted with, that they are trying to resist, and that is feeding into the conflict. And I think that’s the worrying thing as we see there’s mounting tensions within the Indian diaspora,” Ruparelia said.
Prominent political voices in India have also criticized Trudeau for what they call “vote-bank politics” and have accused Canada of not taking concerns around “Khalistani extremists” operating on Canadian soil seriously.
On Wednesday, the Indian government issued an advisory for Indian nationals in Canada in view of “growing anti-India activities and politically-condoned hate crimes and criminal violence in Canada” and Indian media reports have said “anti-India slogans” and slogans against Modi were written on the walls of some Hindu temples in Canada.
Just days before Nijjar’s murder, a Sikh parade in Brampton, Ont., displayed a flotilla on the assassination of former Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi. Indira Gandhi, India’s first and only female prime minister, was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards in 1984 after she ordered an attack on the Golden Temple. She had said that Sikh militants were camped out in the Golden Temple, which is one of Sikhism’s most revered sites.
The Indian government reacted sharply, saying this was not good for the relationship between the countries.
Canada’s ambassador in India, Cameron MacKay, was quick to condemn the parade.
“There is no place in Canada for hate or for the glorification of violence. I categorically condemn these activities.”
But many diaspora groups say the growing tensions reflect bigger worries about influence in Canadian society and politics.
What is Hindu nationalism?
In particular, some groups have pointed to Hindu nationalism, which promotes the idea that India is essentially a nation of and for Hindus. Groups and individuals associated with the ideology have been implicated in violence against minorities. Experts believe there has been a rise in such violence, particularly aimed at Muslims, since Modi took office in 2014.
Human Rights Watch, in its 2023 World Report, said about India, “The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government continued its systematic discrimination and stigmatization of religious and other minorities, particularly Muslims. BJP supporters increasingly committed violent attacks against targeted groups.”
In one such example last month, a railway police officer in India shot dead three Muslim passengers and his superior officer. He proclaimed that only those who supported Modi had a right to stay in India.
“Over the past year, diasporic South Asian and other civil society organizations have been sounding alarm bells and calling on the Trudeau government and the opposition to pay heed to the dangerous build-up of support for the Hindu ethnonationalism of the current government of India on Canadian soil. But these alerts have gone unheeded,” a statement prepared by the South Asian Diaspora Action Collective (SADAC), and signed by several other organizations, said.
SADAC pointed to several incidents they say indicate a growing Hindu nationalist sentiment in Canada, including allegations of death threats against a Toronto filmmaker.
In November last year, a Liberal MP also faced questions and concerns from some activists for attending an event raising a flag associated with the far-right organization Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.
The group is closely associated with Modi and his party and has been criticized for its views on minorities, particularly Muslims, in India.
A member of the group assassinated Mahatma Gandhi in 1948, and the BBC last year described the group as ” the ideological fountainhead of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).”
In March, the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) and the World Sikh Organization (WSO) issued a joint report that said the RSS was actively operating on Canadian soil, as well as in the U.S. and Europe.
That report, which stressed that the RSS’s ideologies “in no way represents the diversity of the hundreds of millions of Hindus who have no interest in adopting the Hindutva ideology,” urged policymakers to pay attention.
“The presence of this supremacist ideology in Canada is deeply concerning,” the report said.
“It is thus time for Canadians to carefully study and track the growth of a movement that disseminates hate here in Canada.”
MONCTON, N.B. – New Brunswick RCMP say two youths have been arrested after an emergency alert was issued Monday evening about someone carrying a gun in the province’s southeast.
Caledonia Region Mounties say they were first called out to Main Street in the community of Salisbury around 7 p.m. on reports of a shooting.
A 48-year-old man was found at the scene suffering from gunshot wounds and he was rushed to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Police say in the interest of public safety, they issued an Alert Ready message at 8:15 p.m. for someone driving a silver Ford F-150 pickup truck and reportedly carrying a firearm with dangerous intent in the Salisbury and Moncton area.
Two youths were arrested without incident later in the evening in Salisbury, and the alert was cancelled just after midnight Tuesday.
Police are still looking for the silver pickup truck, covered in mud, with possible Nova Scotia licence plate HDC 958. They now confirm the truck was stolen from Central Blissville.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
MISSISSAUGA, Ont. – Golf Canada has set an impressive stretch goal of having 30 professional golfers at the highest levels of the sport by 2032.
The World Junior Girls Golf Championship is a huge part of that target.
Credit Valley Golf and Country Club will host the international tournament from Sept. 30 to Oct. 5, with 24 teams representing 23 nations — Canada gets two squads — competing. Lindsay McGrath, a 17-year-old golfer from Oakville, Ont., said she’s excited to be representing Canada and continue to develop her game.
“I’m really grateful to be here,” said McGrath on Monday after a news conference in Credit Valley’s clubhouse in Mississauga, Ont. “It’s just such an awesome feeling being here and representing our country, wearing all the logos and being on Team Canada.
“I’ve always wanted to play in this tournament, so it’s really special to me.”
McGrath will be joined by Nobelle Park of Oakville, Ont., and Eileen Park of Red Deer, Alta., on Team Canada 2. All three earned their places through a qualifying tournament last month.
“I love my teammates so much,” said McGrath. “I know Nobelle and Eileen very well. I’m just so excited to be with them. We have such a great relationship.”
Shauna Liu of Maple, Ont., Calgary’s Aphrodite Deng and Clairey Lin make up Team Canada 2. Liu earned her exemption following her win at the 2024 Canadian Junior Girls Championship while Deng earned her exemption as being the low eligible Canadian on the world amateur golf ranking as of Aug. 7.
Deng was No. 175 at the time, she has since improved to No. 171 and is Canada’s lowest-ranked player.
“I think it’s a really great opportunity,” said Liu. “We don’t really get that many opportunities to play with people from across the world, so it’s really great to meet new people and play with them.
“It’s great to see maybe how they play and take parts from their game that we might also implement our own games.”
Golf Canada founded the World Junior Girls Golf Championship in 2014 to fill a void in women’s international competition and help grow its own homegrown talent. The hosts won for the first time last year when Vancouver’s Anna Huang, Toronto’s Vanessa Borovilos and Vancouver’s Vanessa Zhang won team gold and Huang earned individual silver.
Medallists who have gone on to win on the LPGA Tour include Brooke Henderson of Smiths Falls, Ont., who was fourth in the individual competition at the inaugural tournament. She was on Canada’s bronze-medal team in 2014 with Selena Costabile of Thornhill, Ont., and Calgary’s Jaclyn Lee.
Other notable competitors who went on to become LPGA Tour winners include Angel Yin and Megan Khang of the United States, as well as Yuka Saso of the Philippines, Sweden’s Linn Grant and Atthaya Thitikul of Thailand.
“It’s not if, it’s when they’re going to be on the LPGA Tour,” said Garrett Ball, Golf Canada’s chief operating officer, of how Canada’s golfers in the World Junior Girls Championship can be part of the organization’s goal to have 30 pros in the LPGA and PGA Tours by 2032.
“Events like this, like the She Plays Golf festival that we launched two years ago, and then the CPKC Women’s Open exemptions that we utilize to bring in our national team athletes and get the experience has been important in that pathway.”
The individual winner of the World Junior Girls Golf Championship will earn a berth in next year’s CPKC Women’s Open at nearby Mississaugua Golf and Country Club.
Both clubs, as well as former RBC Canadian Open host site Glen Abbey Golf Club, were devastated by heavy rains through June and July as the Greater Toronto Area had its wettest summer in recorded history.
Jason Hanna, the chief operating officer of Credit Valley Golf and Country Club, said that he has seen the Credit River flood so badly that it affected the course’s playability a handful of times over his nearly two decades with the club.
Staff and members alike came together to clean up the course after the flooding was over, with hundreds of people coming together to make the club playable again.
“You had to show up, bring your own rake, bring your own shovel, bring your own gloves, and then we’d take them down to the golf course, assign them to areas where they would work, and then we would do a big barbecue down at the halfway house,” said Hanna. “We got guys, like, 80 years old, putting in eight-hour days down there, working away.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
NEW YORK (AP) — Fenway Park has the Ted Williams seat. And now Citi Field has the Grimace seat.
The kid-friendly McDonald’s character made another appearance at the ballpark Monday, when the New York Mets unveiled a commemorative purple seat in section 302 to honor “his special connection to Mets fans.”
Wearing his pear-shaped purple costume and a baseball glove on backwards, Grimace threw out a funny-looking first pitch — as best he could with those furry fingers and short arms — before New York beat the Miami Marlins at Citi Field on June 12.
That victory began a seven-game winning streak, and Grimace the Mets’ good-luck charm soon went viral, taking on a life of its own online.
New York is 53-31 since June 12, the best record in the majors during that span. The Mets were tied with rival Atlanta for the last National League playoff spot as they opened their final homestand of the season Monday night against Washington.
The new Grimace seat in the second deck in right field — located in row 6, seat 12 to signify 6/12 on the calendar — was brought into the Shannon Forde press conference room Monday afternoon. The character posed next to the chair and with fans who strolled into the room.
The seat is available for purchase for each of the Mets’ remaining home games.
“It’s been great to see how our fanbase created the Grimace phenomenon following his first pitch in June and in the months since,” Mets senior vice president of partnerships Brenden Mallette said in a news release. “As we explored how to further capture the magic of this moment and celebrate our new celebrity fan, installing a commemorative seat ahead of fan appreciation weekend felt like the perfect way to give something back to the fans in a fun and unique way.”
Up in Boston, the famous Ted Williams seat is painted bright red among rows of green chairs deep in the right-field stands at Fenway Park to mark where a reported 502-foot homer hit by the Hall of Fame slugger landed in June 1946.
So, does this catapult Grimace into Splendid Splinter territory?
“I don’t know if we put him on the same level,” Mets executive vice president and chief marketing officer Andy Goldberg said with a grin.
“It’s just been a fun year, and at the same time, we’ve been playing great ball. Ever since the end of May, we have been crushing it,” he explained. “So I think that added to the mystique.”
