Episode 18: How Many Deaths Will It Take? Remembering the Canadian Farmworkers Union

This is the inspiring tale of a group of dedicated individuals who took up the cause of BC’s Fraser Valley Farmworkers who toiled in dreadful, unregulated conditions in the 1970s and ‘80s. It is a saga with death and violence and courageous union organizing. Drawing upon interviews from the University of the Fraser Valley’s South Asian Institute Union Zindabad! Project, led by the BC Labour Heritage Centre, we hear from those who saw the many wrongs taking place in the fertile fields and vowed to do something about it. It was a social movement as much as a unionizing drive and a meaningful story to this day.

Raj Chouhan. Interview by Dr. Anushay Malik and Bailey Garden. Union Zindabad! Oral Histories. https://vimeo.com/647845189/cd079d62d4

Sarwan Boal. Interview by Dr. Anushay Malik, Donna Sacuta and Bailey Garden. Union Zindabad! Oral Histories. https://vimeo.com/647864515/77bddc099f

Paul Gill. Interview by Dr. Anushay Malik. Union Zindabad! Oral Histories. https://vimeo.com/647886074/b1d321eea2

Harji Sangra. Interview by Dr. Anushay Malik. Union Zindabad! Oral Histories. https://vimeo.com/647925942/55a2bb3e2b

Paul Binning. Interview by Dr. Anushay Malik. Union  Zindabad! Oral Histories. https://vimeo.com/647891048/1d6bb7438e

Harinder Mahil. Interview by  Dr. Anushay Malik. Union  Zindabad! Oral Histories.  https://vimeo.com/647930201

MUSIC and Cesar Chavez: A Time to Rise. Directed by Anand Patwardhan and Jim Monro, 1981. National Film Board. Used with permission.

Donna Sacuta, et al. “Union Zindabad! - Labour History Research - South Asian Canadian Legacy Project (SACLP).” South Asian Canadian Legacy Project, University of the Fraser Valley, South Asian Studies Institute, 23 June 2022, https://saclp.southasiancanadianheritage.ca/union-zindabad-labour-history/.

RESEARCH: Research and script for this episode by Patricia Wejr & Rod Mickleburgh. Production by John Mabbott. 

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