February 24, 2000 - Ujjal Dosanjh - a podcast by Stephen Hammond

Ujjal Dosanjh is Canada’s first Indo Canadian to be named premier. Ujjal Dosanjh was born in India in 1947, then moved to England before settling in Canada in 1968. In British Columbia, he earned a BA from Simon Fraser University and a law degree from the University of British Columbia before setting up his own law practice in Vancouver. He got involved with human rights work through the Civil Liberties Association, multicultural support organizations and the Farm Workers' Union. Although a moderate in the Indo Canadian community, Dosanjh learned about political extremism and brutality the hard way when he was attacked and severely beaten one day by members of his community who did not share his views. He entered British Columbia politics in 1991 as an NDP MLA, and eventually worked his way through a number of cabinet portfolios, including the honoured role of attorney general between 1995 and 2000. When his premier, Glen Clark, was involved in a scandal involving favouritism toward a neighbour, Dosanjh was not able to protect him. Premier Clark stepped down and Dosanjh won the leadership of his party. Dosanjh was sworn in as British Columbia’s premier – the first Indo Canadian to hold that title – on February 24, 2000. However, due to his predecessor’s scandal and other political blunders, the following year’s election wiped out all but two of the NDP MLAs, and Dosanjh was not one of them. He returned to practice law until Prime Minister Paul Martin asked him to change parties and run for the federal Liberals. Dosanjh agreed and won a seat in the election of June 2004. The next month, he was appointed federal minister of health in Martin’s short-lived government.

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