Indo-Canadian Diaspora

Abstract

The word Diaspora is not a substitute for the word immigrant. Diaspora essentially is a bitter experience of dislocation that leads to alienation, a sense of loss and nostalgic desires. It refers to that particular class of immigrants who are unable to go back, primarily because of the hostile climate of discrimination in the country of birth. The hostile climate is intolerable in the land of birth and tolerable in the land of adoption. Usually Diasporans are not happy anywhere, and suffer silently. Diaspora in Greek means dispersion or scattering. In Hebrew, the word that is used for Diaspora is Galut, which means exile. It referred to the Jewish communities scattered in exile outside Palestine. Those Jewish communities were exiled from their homeland by Roman authorities between 66 and 70 CE. Diaspora therefore is “expulsion of a national from his country by the government or voluntary removal of a citizen, usually in order to escape punishment.” Here the word Diaspora is contemplated on in a special reference of those Canadians whose origins trace back to India. Most Canadians of Indian origin prefer to identify themselves as, “Indian”, rather than “East Indian” or “South Asian” basically because these two terms are used to distinguish these people of ancestral origin from India. Another term, NRI (non-resident Indian), is used by Indians in India to refer to Indians abroad, including Canada. This paper will be focusing on the roots of Indo-Canadian Diaspora that actually began in the beginning of the 20th century of which the main pioneers were the Sikhs. Most Sikhs were the veterans of British Army. These were in fact those retired soldiers for whom the pension was not sufficient for livelihood. As their lands were still gripped by the money-lenders; as a result of which they had to turn back to the places they‟d visited including the western coast of Canada. This was the phase of Indian Diaspora where people joined from the various parts of the world also like Burma, Malaysia, the East Indies, the Philippines, and China. The Indian Diaspora started mainly after the British made India a part of the empire. Indians were taken as forced labour in the nineteenth century to other parts of the empire, including Fiji, Maritius, Guyana, Trinidad, Suriname and Malaysia. Canada has a sizeable number of immigrants of Indian origin from African and Caribbean nations. Several of them are the descendents of the Indian Diaspora of colonial days.