Two Canadian MPs join commemoration of Kashmiri Hindu exodus

Getting such support from MPs for the first time has enthused members of the community in Canada who hope that a motion would soon be tabled in Canada’s Parliament to acknowledge the violence and persecution the community.

With two Canadian MPs joining in the commemoration of the 31st anniversary of the “ethnic cleansing” of Kashmiri Hindus in 1990, members of the diaspora are hopeful that the tragedy will also be acknowledged in the country’s Parliament.

Kashmiri Hindu migrants shout slogans against Jammu and Kashmir government during a protest in Jammu in 2020. (HT file photo)

In a statement on the 31st anniversary of the attack on Hindus in Kashmir sent to the Indo-Canadian Kashmir Forum (ICKF), Warren Steinley, an MP from the province of Saskatchewan, expressed his “deep sadness” in commemorating the “attack on the Hindu population of Kashmir valley in January 1990 by cross border militants.”

He also commended the “resilience and courage” exhibited by members of the Kashmiri pandit community “who survived this gruesome ethnic cleansing.”

These views were also echoed by Indo-Canadian MP Bob Saroya who had earlier issued a similar message and conveyed his condolences “to the families and friends of all those who were killed, raped and injured in this massacre.”

Saroya, who represents a riding (constituency) in the Greater Toronto Area became the first-ever Canadian MP to issue a statement of this nature, and described the events of 1990 as a “gruesome genocide”.

Getting such support from MPs for the first time has enthused members of the community in Canada. Vidya Dhar, director of the ICKF, said they were hopeful that a motion would soon be tabled in Canada’s Parliament that is an “acknowledgement” of the violence and persecution the community faced prior and during its exodus from the Valley.

While community groups usually take out a procession to mark the anniversary each year, restrictions due to the Covid-19 pandemic led to them adopting an inventive manner this year. The ICKF, along with the Hindu Forum Canada, had a truck with LE display panels marking the event, travel through the GTA, including Toronto and Vaughan, where it stopped in front of the Pakistani Consulate.