After the tragic destruction of AIR INDIA flight 182, the Kanishka, which resulted in the loss of 329 people in 1985, it can be confidently said that Canada has had its worst act of terrorism. But, of course, families of the victims are disturbed when people are trying to make a hero out of this man, Talwinder Singh Parmar, who masterminded this attack.
Some accounts suggest a portrait of Parmar in a Sikh temple in Surrey, British Columbia; he also became an advertising figure by being pictured on a billboard sign in the town.
For instance, Deepak Khandelwal is one of the victims who lost his sisters in this tragedy; he thinks that this is a clear implication that pro-Khalistan factions have been activated by the Canadian authorities’ inactivity or silence on the issue.
They are trying to fill the vacuum through misleading information, Mr Khandelwal said, adding that the Public Inquiry clearly stated that Parmar was the mastermind of the bombing plan.
Through the Canadian Prime Minister’s office, the government released a formal statement on the anniversary, but the families’ claims were otherwise trampled.
Currently, the Cal professor who is archiving the tragedy in the form of a museum known as Mortality and Mourning the Morbid museum has 47 garment factory workers’ bodies; Professor Chandrima Chakraborty said that the “negligence and mistreatment of the families continues.
Canada has recognized Parmar, though a 2010 commission of inquiry stated that he was “either the chief planner or one of the chief planners” Nevertheless, the sanctification continues, especially as the next stage of the Khalistan Referendum is named in his honour. Families are disappointed that the people of the United States feel the tragedy has been almost wiped out from memory.
