Gujarati to Odia, Canada has ’em all
ALL AND SUNDRY While Sikhs were the first Indian immigrants to Canada, today it’s home to a diverse Indian community
TORONTO: On February 21, the Indian Consulate in Toronto organised a poetry programme to mark International Mother Language Day. Officials were pleasantly surprised at the participation and attendance at the event. Despite a winter storm and inches of snow on the ground, nearly 100 people arrived, and a babel of voices joined in the recitals.
The dominant Indian languages in Canada, Punjabi and Hindi were represented, but what was illuminating was the variety of tongues — from Odia and Bengali to Gujarati and Tamil, and even Sanskrit and Brajbhasa, it reflected India’s linguistic diversity.
This event is one indicator of the shift in demographics of the Indian diaspora in Canada in recent times.
In terms of Indian immigration, Canada has been inextricably linked with Sikhs. With reason. Historically, that community has flocked to this huge and sparsely populated nation for over a century. A substantial part of the immigration was from rural Punjab, attracted to fertile areas like the province of British Columbia.
But a definite change in the profile of the Indian immigrant is evident in a more urban, highlyeducated class moving to the country. “There’s been an upskilling of Indian immigration over the last decade or so as immigrant flows respond to Canadian immigration policy and its growing emphasis on skilled migration and migrants with higher human capital who can integrate easily into the labour market,” said Margaret Walton-Roberts, Associate Director of the International Migration Research Centre of the Wilfrid Laurier University.
Between 2004 and 2013, according to data from the Canadian Immigration and Citizenship department, over 310,000 Indians became permanent residents of Canada; in total second only to the Chinese among immigrant groups.
Punjabi speakers had mostly used the family reunification route to community building but as the Canadian Government increasingly started toughening its stand on that pathway, those numbers declined. But even immigrants from Punjab have adapted to the changes and are increasingly urban professionals, and students.
“The Canadian Government wants young people with strong English skills. That has somewhat changed the focus to people from larger cities in India,” Ravi Jain, a leading immigration lawyer with the Toronto-based firm of Green & Spiegel LLP, said.
Those changing patterns are also reflected in how Indian culture is observed in the country. Anu Srivastava, who chairs Panorama India, an umbrella organisation of Indian community groups, pointed out that earlier almost 90 per cent of the affiliated groups were from North India, whereas now “there’s a mix of all, an even distribution.”
In fact, the boom in Indianorigin population has led to the very number of those associated groups to expand fivefold in a decade. “Earlier, if I wanted to showcase Kathakali or Bharat Natyam, it was that much harder. We celebrated Rabindranath Tagore’s 100th anniversary a couple of years ago and that wouldn’t have been possible earlier,” she said.
Tellingly, in recent years Panorama India has been able to showcase the Northeast at its signature India Day Festival and Parade in Toronto, which in 2014 also featured for the first time, cultural representation from the newest Indian state of Telangana.
In fact, she argued that 10 years ago, even an event like the planned community reception for Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Ricoh Coliseum in Toronto wouldn’t have been possible. Azad Kaushik, President of the National Alliance of Indo-Canadians, the non-profit group holding that reception, was surprised at the response, “We had opened the window for 72 hours and we had over 18,000 people registering and only 10,000 spots available.”
The population of migrants from the PM’s home state is among those that has burgeoned in recent years. Vipul Jani, founder-editor of the oldest Gujarati publication in the country, Gujarat Abroad, claimed that their number may be as high as 400,000 at this time, out of a total Indo-Canadian population approaching 1.5 million.
Over time, it appears, the Indo-Canadian population has started resembling that of the diaspora in the country to Canada’s south, the US. PREM WATSA Born in Hyderabad, he is known as the Warren Buffet of the North. Founded Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited, a firm with investments of $30 bn RUSSELL PETERS Born in Brampton to parents hailing from Bombay and Calcutta, he is among the highest-grossing stand-up comedians globally DEEPA MEHTA The Toronto-based director was born in Amritsar. She earned global renown for her ‘Elements Trilogy — Earth, Fire and Water’ SIM BHULLAR
Also from Brampton, the 7 feet 5 inches tall, he made history this month by becoming the first person of Indian origin to sign up for a NBA franchise ROHINTON MISTRY The author who lives in the Toronto suburb of Brampton has been celebrated in literary circles for decades, for ‘Such a Long Journey’ and ‘A Fine Balance’ VIKRAM VIJ Celebrity chef, based in Vancouver. Born in Amritsar, Vij has appeared on popular Canadian culinary shows like Top Chef Canada and Recipe to Riches