Man who won right for Sikhs to wear turbans in Canadian legions dies

A prominent figure in the Sikh-Canadian community who fought and won a high profile battle to allow Sikhs wearing turbans into Royal Canadian Legions, has died.

95-year-old Lt.-Col. Pritam Singh Jauhal passed away peacefully in Surrey over the weekend.

Jauhal fought for the British Empire in World War II, but on Remembrance Day in 1993 he was denied entrance to the Newton Legion in Surrey because of his turban and legion rules forbidding the wearing of hats and headgear.

“They had tried to explain that as soldiers they had fought with their turbans on so this was not something that was unknown to soldiers who had fought in World War II,” said Satwinder Bains, director for the centre for Indo-Canadian studies at the University of the Fraser Valley. “But the legion was adamant that they take them off at the door.”

“[Jauhal] didn’t understand that in the Commonwealth countries, how Canada could even think that people of the Sikh faith, who had fought in wars alongside Canadians and Europeans and people all over the world, could be not allowed into a legion,” said Bains.

Jauhal’s belief in religious freedom also led him to speak out against the Conservative government’s ban on Muslim women covering their faces during citizenship ceremonies.

Jauhal’s memoir, A Soldier Remembers, was published in 2013.

Bains says Jauhal will be remembered as a kind man who stood up for what he believed in.

“He had that in him, that gentle nature and yet that steel will and determination. This was who he was,” said Bains.

WSO Statement On Passing Of Lt. Col. Pritam Singh Jauhal

—The World Sikh Organization of Canada offers its tributes to Lt. Col. Pritam Singh Jauhal who passed away on Sunday at the age of 95.  Lt. Col Jauhal led the struggle to wear turbans in Royal Canadian Legion halls in the early 1990s.

In 1993 Lt. Col Jauhal, a World War II veteran and other Sikhs were barred from entering the Royal Canadian Legion in Surrey because of their turbans after the annual Remembrance Day parade.  The WSO had supported Lt. Col. Jauhal in his attempts to have the Legion permit the wearing of the turban.  The national organization eventually changed its policy after a national debate.

WSO Senior Policy Advisor Gian Singh Sandhu said today, “the WSO had the privilege of working with Lt. Col. Jauhal in his struggle to have the turban accommodated at Royal Canadian Legion halls.  We will remember him for his courage and determination. His unwavering commitment to justice and human rights is an inspiration.  Our sincerest condolences are with his family.”

WSO President Mukhbir Singh said, “Lt. Col. Jauhal is a Canadian Sikh icon and he is an example for the next generation of Canadian Sikhs that equity and human rights are worth struggling for.  He displayed that same commitment to human rights most recently when he opposed laws limiting the freedoms of Muslim women who wear the niqab.  Lt. Col. Jauhal’s contributions to the Canadian Sikh community will be fondly remembered.”