Whatta proud moment for Punjabis worldwide..!!
The BIG news came down to me and I was like..wohooooooooooo…Punjabi is actually among the top 3 languages spoken in the Canadian Parliament..!!
This historic announcement was recently made after the election of 20 Punjabi-speaking candidates to the Parliament in October…in which Indo Canadian candidates were 18 Liberals and two Conservatives.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau-designated is scheduled to unveil his Cabinet this week and some of these Liberal MPs are expected to be included in the front bench.
Navdeep Bains of Canada’s Liberal Party said :”It speaks of our commitment to diversity and allowing individual to play an important role in our political institutions”.
MP Deepak Obhrai of Conservative Party said, “The voice of the Indo-Canadian community will now be very well represented in the Parliament. In the overall aspect of it, the South Asian community won.”
Some stats on languages spoken in the top 5 Canadian metropolitan areas:
- In Toronto, about one-third spoke one of five languages: Cantonese (8.8%), Punjabi (8.0%), Chinese, not specified (7.0%), Urdu (5.9%) and Tamil (5.7%).
- Montreal: Arabic (107,000) and Spanish (95,000) account for nearly one-third of people speaking an immigrant language
- Vancouver: Punjabi is the most frequently reported immigrant home language
- Calgary: Punjabi and Tagalog are the top immigrant home languages
- Ottawa – Gatineau: Arabic and Spanish are the most frequently reported immigrant home languages
- Edmonton: Tagalog and Punjabi are the most reported immigrant home languages.
