Faux pas: Canadian leader wishes Sikhs on Bandi Chhor, uses Kerala festival pic

Toronto Days after losing Federal elections to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party, Canada’s Conservative Party leader Andrew Scheer suffered an embarrassment. He extended his wishes to the country’s Sikh population on Bandi Chhor Diwas on social media, but the image accompanying the post was from a festival native to Kerala.

Toronto Days after losing Federal elections to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party, Canada’s Conservative Party leader Andrew Scheer suffered an embarrassment. He extended his wishes to the country’s Sikh population on Bandi Chhor Diwas on social media, but the image accompanying the post was from a festival native to Kerala.

Scheer’s well-intentioned posts were put up on Twitter and Facebook. Bandi Chhor Diwas coincides with Diwali (celebrated on October 27 this year) and is observed to mark the release of Sikh guru Hargobind Singh by Mughal emperor Jahangir.

Many Sikhs pointed out that the image with the posts was associated with a different form of worship, the Theyyam festival. This is celebrated in Kerala. The image had earlier appeared on the Facebook page of Portraits of India which described the particular image as, “One variation of ‘Pottan Theyyam’, a vivid, lively and colourful ritualistic performance, which comes in the traditional art form of Theyyam. It is believed that Pottan Theyyam is a manifestation of Shiva.”

Among those who referred to the error was the World Sikh Organisation (WSO), which tweeted: “This image has no link to the Sikh community or to the Bandi Chhor Diwas.” It thanked Scheer and his party for the greeting, but requested him to “please correct this image as it misrepresents the occasion.”

It took a while for the mistake to be realised. Irked at the delay, WSO office-bearer Jaskaran Sandhu tweeted, “The image used is not even close to anything Sikh/Bandi Chhor Diwas. They know they have it wrong, but don’t fix it.”

It took over two days before any action was taken and that came about after Canadian outlet Global News reported on the issue. Ultimately, the post with the greeting and the picture was deleted from Scheer’s social media feeds.

Strap/Blurb

Conservative Party leader Andrew Scheer deletes the erroneous post after Sikhs point out the error and a TV channel reports on the issue, over two days after he first put it up