1970: Founding of the Hindu Society of Manitoba

The Hindu Society of Manitoba was started in 1970, and inaugurated on May 23, 1970. Two of the founding members were Dr. Atish Maniar and Mr. Vir Bharti. I remember Atish Maniar saying he regretted that Hindus could not get married in a Hindu ceremony in Winnipeg and so he worked towards making that practical. I recall Vir Bharti saying we spend twenty four hours a day seven days a week on material aspects of life – surely we should be able to spare two or three hours to come together for communal worship so that our children get to know what Hinduism is about.

In 1970, Vir Bharti initiated the Sunday School, that was formalized in 1978 as Vidya Bhavan. During the mid 1970s, Diwali, festival of lights, was celebrated with a community dinner and cultural show held at a rented church hall.

There were fifty members in 1970-1971. In the beginning, the prayer meetings were held in people’s houses, then at Thawani Towers, and then at the International Centre on Redwood.

In 1979, a church building that stood at 854 Ellice Avenue was bought for $75,000. There was a daycare in the building during the week until their lease ran out. The pictures show three phases of its growth, the first two showing the temple in 1979 and 1995 respectively, and the third one with the kalasha on top, the crowning glory of a temple, installed in 1998.

Today the Hindu Society of Manitoba runs two temples, one on Ellice Avenue and one on St.Anne’s Street, has a membership of about six hundred families, a congregation of a thousand or more people on festival days, and religious activities almost every day at one or other of the two temples. It has a full time priest at St. Anne’s, a part-time priest at Ellice, and several other priests licensed to perform marriages.

But we must remember it started because of a few individuals who had a dream in the late 1960s, and worked to make it come true.