4 - Sunday, August 21, 1994 - North Shore News

ND

‘q ®

RECENTLY, I damned near
became a republican.

A friend had called to say the
Queen was going to have tea with
the five turbans who were denied
admittance to the Newton Legion.

The headline in the paper did
seem to bear out what my friend
had said. “Legion-barred Sikhs to
sip tea with the Queen,” thus giving
the impression that they were to
have a private little tea party, per-
haps at the Queen's request.

But it was clear from the story
that the whole thing was an NDP
ploy designed to embarrass the
Legion and suck up to the Sikh
vote, although it wasn't described
as such.

Mike Harcourt, urged on by
Moe Sihota, no doubt, had invited
the five Sikhs to a royal ““walka-
bout” and tea party in a Victoria
park. The Queen would be briefed
on the issue and a government offi-
cial (meaning Harcourt & Co.)
would decide who she talked to.

So I didn’t become a republican.
after all.

Meanwhile, other things con-
nected with this involve a North
Shore man, Sikh
doings during the war
and a Vancouver
columnist.

As we all know,
the Vancouver media
usually depict all
Sikhs as victims of
white “racism.” And
one would think that
the Sikh hasn't been
born who wasn't a
war hero,

But Jimmy Irvine
of North Van wrote to
columnist Don Huncer of the
Province, pointing out that of the
65,000 Indian Army troops taken
prisoner at Singapore i in 1941,
25.000 went Gver to the Japanese
and joined the so-called “Indian
National Army.”

He referred to the book To The
Kwai And Back, by Ronald Searle,
the famous British cartoonist who
was in Changi prison camp.

"One of the book's drawings
(done at the time, to Searle's con-
siderable risk) shows a Sikh prepar-
ing to beat a British officer who
had failed to salute a Sikh guard.

Doug
Collins

ON THE OTHER HAND

“Most visible guard duties out-
side the wire were taken over by
Sikhs, who gratuitously thrashed
any unfortunate who caught their
eye,” wrote Searle.

Hunter’s article appeared under

- the heading: “Sikhs: Another

View.”

6& The NDP bosses are confident

that their support.of turban arrogance
is a public relations coup. 99

Sikhs were even used as execu-
tioners. An Australian Broadcasting
Commission documentary has
described how two British and two
Australians had been sentenced to
death for trying to escape.

“An inept Indian National Army
firing squad were stil! firing and
wounding the victims when the
Japanese commander ordered them
to stop.” Which didn’t save the
men, of course. As with the
Japanese, so with Hitler. Two thou-
sand East Indians, “including tur-
banned Sikhs” went over to the
Nazis after being captured in North

> sucking up to
ikhs with tea party

Africa.

They never saw action. Hitler
regarded them as a joke. So wrote
British author and military histori-
an John Keegan in Waffen SS: The
Asphatt Soldiers.

T asked Hunter what reaction
there had been. No-one had denied
the facts, he said, but what fol-
lowed in The Indo-Canadian Voice
was “the most incredible excess in
journalism” he had ever seen.

An editorial compared Hunter's
pisce to the radio broadcasts in
Rwanda that had urged the slaugh-
ter of the Tutsis

“It was abuse of the media for
the most evil purposes, a case
where those in a position to influ-
ence vast numbers of people were
spreading hatred and causing the
death of countless innocents.

“Your recent Sikh-bashing
columns have been just such an
abuse,” declared the Voice’s editor-
ial.

Some voice! Never mind about
the truth. Never mi.:d, either, about
the Sikh slaughters in the Punjab in
which Hindu men, women and even
children have been murdered.

“Sikhs kill 125 on
trains. Massacre blood-
ics Punjab state.” (June
16, 1991.)

Did The Voice ever
compzure that sort of
thing to Rwanda?

Back to the Queen
and the royal “tea”
party.”

The Harcourt-
Sihota move is a slap
in the face to velerans
who have been the
monarchy’s most loyal
supporters. But it delights most of
our media, plus minorities who are
determined to impose their ways on
us.

That was what the turban issue
was all about.

The polls showed that at least
two-thirds of British Columbians
supported the Newton Legion.

We can be sure there will be no
mention of that it in the “briefing.”

The NDP bosses are confident
that their support of turban arro-
gance is a public relations coup.

On the contrary, it will only
increase many people's wrath.

West Van stabbing report reveals vandalism

A TEEN who reported he was stabbed Aug. 2 near
. Ridgeview elementary school in West Vancouver was
found to be cut from broken glass associated with van-

dalism at the school.

According to a West Vancouver Police spokesman, a
17-year-old West Vancouver male claimed he was
stabbed at around midnight. Police discovered a trail of
blood from the teen to the nearby elementary school
where several of the school's windows were found to be

broken.

| The Tilley Hat is acknowledged the best outdoor Rat
f én the world: smart-looking and comfortable, it has a
against wearing out. And it’s super
for soaring, great for gliding and perfect for piloting’

. Ufetime guarantee

(ST ROA EL

mischief.

The teen and a !5-year-old West Vancouver girl
were taken to Lions Gate Hospital for medical attention.
Both teenagers are facing charges of committing

Meanwhile West Vancouver Police are investigating
a suspicious car fire on Berkley Drive Aug. 18 at 1:54
a.m. The owner of the 1972 Austin mini was awakened
by his car burglar alarm. He called the West Vancouver
Fire Department and dampened the fire with a garden

hose before firefighters arrived and put it out.

I'ma big fan of your hats. .

! own three presently, The
first one has been used as ry .

i head warmer, head protector
and sun obstructor as it has
accompanied me on more
than 500 soaring flights. It
has been to an altitude of

25,000 feet twice,

gai All in all, it has been a good

” friend of mine.

E. Douglas Whitehead, MD,
New York, New York;

NVD zoning bylaw
changes criticized

NORTH VANCOUVER
District's planning depart-
ment came under heavy fire
from a handful of residents
at an Aug. 9 public hearing
of a “housekeeping text
amendment.”

NORTH VANCOUVER
DISTRICT COUNCIL
By Martin Millerchip

They suggested that the
opportunities for increasing den-
sity and building height in the
bylaw were not being adequately
explained to council and the pub-
lic.

“Planners must provide and
show a high degree of technical
skills. This bylaw illustrates
either a lack of such abilities in
supposedly correcting previous
‘mistakes’ or a hidden agenda,
Neither of these possibilities is
good news to me,” charged long-
time council watcher Corrie
Kost.

A substantial reorganization
of part of the district’s zoning
bylaw was adopted by council on
Dec. 13, 1993,

Seven weeks ago council was
told that plunning staff “have
identified several items which
necessitate further amendments
to refine the regulations.”

The staff report was headlined
Housekeeping Text Amendments
and the proposed bylaw was not
referred to the Advisory
Planning Commission.

The advertisement of the
bylaw's public hearing placed in
the North Shore News by the
district contained two short para-
graphs that read:

“Proposed text amendment:
To amend the definition of “resi-

WEST VANCOUVER

925-3655 cOMouR’

dential building, muliiple-family
townhouse,” include commercial
purposes as a permitted use in
RL Zones and allow detached
units in the RM3 Zone.

Purpose: To further refine the
residential regulations enacted
under Bylaw 6543."

Kost said the advertisement
scemed “quite innocuous” but
the rather vague wording aroused
his interest and that “after obtain-
ing the full text cf the proposed
bylaw it was clear to me that this
was more than just simply a
housekeeping text amendment.”

Kost said that the new defini-
ion for multiple-family town-
houses would remove the
tequirement for “vertical separa-
tion” (traditional side-by side
units) and allow stacked units,

Kost said his main concern
was the possibility of adding
more units per acre and won-
dered whether the target was “a
well-known project in Seymour.”

He suggested that if staff
wished to increase density in
town-house zoning they should
introduce a new zoning class
“with appropriate nomenclature,”

Kost went on to illustrate that
allowing single-family detached
units in RM3 (18 units/acre, 45
units/ha) and RM6 (24
unils/acre, 60 units/ha) zones
could also allow increased densi-
ty.

Said Kost: “The later conver-
sion of a single-family detached
home occupying such a zone’
would result in a significant
increase in the number of family
units than was generally agreed
to at the public hearing process
for a particular project.”

Mayor Murray Dykeman told
council that the chairman’ of the
Advisory Planning Commission
has asked for the bylaw to be.
referred to its next meeting.

WINDON 2); amm

NORTH VANCOUVER
1226 Marine Dr.

984-4407