Surrey Police to scan Vaisakhi parade for terror links

by Barry Artiste | March 28, 2008 at 05:15 am

1005 views | 0 Recommendations | 0 comments

Opinion
Barry Artiste, Now Public Contributor

Vaisakhi, a 300 year old Sikh Harvest Festival, similar to our Thanksgiving is attended by well over 100,000 people, complete with parades and floats, though marred last year by the majority of celebrants honouring large photos displayed on parade floats featuring Air India Bombers and India's Political Assassins who became Terrorist Martyrs. Terrorists featured prominiently much to the embarrassment of unwitting Canadian Politicians of every political stripe who attended the festival not knowing the ramifications of their actions, until pointed out by police and media.

Certainly another case once again whereby Politicians not bothering to observe or pretending to understand a multicultural festival displaying iconic terrorist martyrs.
Though we all know their reasoning, the reasoning being a politicians quest to garner the ethnic vote regardless of their Personal Leaning or Morality.

These Terrorist Martyrs also featured those involved in the tragic air india bombing over two decades ago is still being fought in the courts of Canada today and reported in the media regularly, so Politicians cannot be excused for their stupidity. The Air India Bombing was initiated by these Terrorists, resulting in hundreds of innocent men, women and children were tragically blown out of the sky over the coast of Ireland.

Thankfully these Terrorists will not be featured at this years festival.

A Harvest festival, should be just that, good food, good music, good people and good times, a festival of thanksgiving displaying politics and terror should play no part in these festivities.

Below is a link to my story from May 2006 when I reported the going ons of politicians who attended this festival when it was more of a terrorist theme than it's originally intended tradition celebrating the Sikh religion and Harvest.

http://www.nowpublic.com/premier_campbell_disco_dances_at_vaisakhi_festival

Police to scan parade for terror linksLast year's Surrey Vaisakhi parade honoured Sikh 'martyrs'Kim Bolan, Vancouver SunPublished: Thursday, March 27, 2008
Surrey RCMP will screen all floats in this year's Vaisakhi parade to ensure that there is no glorification of terrorists or political violence like there was last year, Chief Supt. Fraser MacRae said Thursday.
MacRae said the RCMP and the City of Surrey want to avoid any repeat of 2007's display by organizers of several assassins and terrorists who were honoured as martyrs or "shaheeds" on parade floats.
Included as a martyr was Air India bombing mastermind Talwinder Singh Parmar, as well as the assassins of Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi and slain leaders of the International Sikh Youth Federation and the Babbar Khalsa, both banned groups in Canada.
The event, organized by Dasmesh Darbar Sikh temple, is scheduled for April 12 and expected to attract more than 100,000 people.
"We have had ongoing frequent dialogue with the temple executive regarding our and the city expectations for a successful Vaisakhi parade this year," MacRae said. "What we want the parade to be is what it is intended to be, which is a celebration of the Sikh religion, a celebration of the harvest. It is not a place for political statement especially insofar as those types of images that celebrate acts of violence."
MacRae said last year's glorification of violence was "extremely inappropriate."
MLAs and MPs from all parties attended last year's parade.