"Sir Richard McBride, then the Conservative premier of British Columbia, made clear the explicit racism of Canada’s policies on the night the Komagata Maru reached Vancouver.
“To admit Orientals in large numbers would mean the end, the extinction of the white people,” he said. “And we always have in mind the necessity of keeping this a white man’s country.”
After an almost two-month standoff, which also involved feisty demonstrations by ethnic Indians on Vancouver’s shores, the ship was eventually turned away. When it reached Calcutta, now Kolkata, in India, British colonial authorities attempted to seize suspected Sikh radicals on board. The semi-riot that ensued saw security forces kill at least 19 passengers and arrest many others.
The incident is a reminder, particularly for Canada’s considerable Sikh population, of the widespread discrimination and bigotry meted out on Indians and other Asians on the west coast of the Americas a century ago.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/05/18/the-tragic-story-behind-justin-trudeaus-apology-in-canadas-parliament/?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_canada-6am-stream%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
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