ABBOTSFORD Mayor Ross Siemens and city councillors Les Barkman, Kelly Chahal, Patricia Driessen, Simon Gibson, Dave Loewen, Patricia Ross, Dave Sidhu and Mark Warkentin along with Raj Singh Toor of the Descendants of the Komagata Maru Society on Saturday formally unveiled the Komagata Maru Way sign and three new interpretive panels outside at the National Historic Site Gur Sikh Temple. Mike de Jong, MLA for Abbotsford West, was also present.

The commemorative street renaming, between Fairlane Street to Ware Street, serves to honour 352 passengers of the Komagata Maru who were denied entry into Canada due to the government’s application of racist and exclusionary immigration laws and essentially kept as ship-bound prisoners for two full months before being sent back to India.

The panels highlight the humanitarian efforts of Abbotsford’s Sikh community who provided for passengers left stranded aboard the Komagata Maru steamship while it sat in the Burrard Inlet from May to July 1914. They were designed by the South Asian Studies Institute with support from the Descendants of the Komagata Maru Society.