Vancouver’s parks board wants the public’s feedback on where a memorial to a dark chapter in the city’s history should be located.
Parks staff have selected two potential sites for a monument to the 1914 Komagata Maru incident — in which more than 375 passengers from the Punjab were denied permission to land in Vancouver and were forced to sail to India after two months languishing in Burrard Inlet.
Twenty passengers were killed in a shooting exchange.
Parks Commissioner Raj Hundal, calling the incident a “black mark on Canadian history,” said the memorial would serve to educate the public and recognize a past wrong.
The monument is funded by the federal government’s Community Historical Recognition Program, through the Khalsa Diwan Society.
The potential sites were selected due to their proximity to this historic incident.
One of the sites is in Stanley Park near the Brockton Oval.
The other potential site is Harbour Green Park in Coal Harbour.
Future feedback will help determine the monument’s design.
