Five to eight bodies on an average is the number of Indian students with permits or those in transition to a work permit in Canada, mortal remains of whom are repatriated back to India every month. The high number of deaths of Indian youth in Canada over the past few years has been flagged by funeral homes in Ontario’s Greater Toronto Area yet again in the backdrop of the recent diplomatic row between the two countries.
Some of these are suicides while others are accidents, killings, accidental drug overdose, heart attacks and drowning, among others. As the toll remains, the Canadian government has not taken any concrete steps to reason such untimely deaths or work for their mental health, said those handling the bodies.
Beyond the housing, food and job crises in Canadian cities that are home to scores of international students, the struggle for foreign students or those starting to work in this North American country runs much deeper than what is told.
The crises, especially post-pandemic, has brought high pressure on these young foreign students who come to Canada immediately after finishing their school, and then wrestle to find an accommodation and a job to pay off their expenses. Many are even clearing the loans their parents had taken to send them off.
The high number of deaths of international students, a large section of whom are Indian youth in their early 20s, has been reported in the Canadian press as well, more so in the post-pandemic years.
While the federal statistics in Canada does not track the number of deaths of international students per se or the reasons of the same, the estimates have been given out by the two funeral homes, which in coordination with the Consulate General of India, repatriate the bodies back to the Indian families.
A post-mortem is carried out only for deaths that are deemed suspicious by the police. It is the police, who decides which body will go to the coroner’s office.
“It’s heart-breaking”, says Inderjit Bal, co-owner and president of Brampton crematorium, “to see men and women in their early 20s dying at this rate in a country where they came to study and perhaps earn a living.”
According to Bal, his funeral home repatriates around four bodies of Indian youths a month on an average, most of whom are on study permits or have transitioned to work visa. “This has been the case over the past two years. The numbers started rising from 2018-19 onwards since the influx of Indian students in Canada started to grow exponentially. We have raised the issue with the education minister here as well again recently, but there has been no response from them,” he said.
Bal raised several issues with the Canadian minister that have put students under undue pressure. “We asked them to make it a rule for colleges and universities to provide hostel facilities for students at least in the first year and second, we asked them to hold a training session on how to go about their new journey once the students land here. We are yet to hear from the minister’s office,” said Bal.
The reasons for the deaths under suspicious circumstances are investigated by the police, he said. While only the families can request post-mortem reports, in some cases, the families back in India request Gurdwaras to make arrangements for the funerals and entrust them with the papers. That’s how some of these religious centres found out that a number of students are dying of drug overdose and raised the issue with the authorities earlier this year.
Since Bal’s crematorium has been handling a high number of bodies, he blamed the high pressure that students are under when they come here. “The parents have a dream for their child to see them settled in this foreign land. It is so difficult to handle such deaths, it’s most unfortunate. And more of these young people are men in the early 20s. They have to struggle hard to find a place to live, find a job to work part-time to be able to spare the fee and pay loans. It’s too much to handle for a young person out of school in a foreign land. Some of them just come under depression and take the extreme step or get into drugs for a refuge,” he explained.
Then there are road accidents and violence-related killings, he added. A number of students get excited upon seeing so many water bodies while they don’t know how to swim they just go out in the water. Most cases of drowning have been reported during summer.
While the students are on their own here, most of the families are not able to bear the expenses of their funeral and repatriation, which is anywhere between 11,000 CAD and 13,000 CAD, and the funeral homes or friends/relatives have to raise funds for the same, he said.
Friends are usually the first ones who are informed about the funeral services, which then check with the police, get a “warrant to bury” and co-ordinate with the Indian consulate for sending it back to the family. It’s a long process that takes around a week to 10 days when there are no legal challenges involved.
The Indian consulate too sometimes helps monetarily, but that is only for the airfare. “The airfare is quite high, as the body has to be sent back in a cargo. The whole process is quite expensive. The Indian community here is generous and mostly comes forward in raising funds,” said Bal.
Harminder Hansi, director, Lotus Funeral Home and Crematorium, which has been repatriating bodies from across Canada, too said they send back around 3-4 Indian youths’ remains every month.
“Post-pandemic, while the number of Indian students coming to Canada grew, the deaths have also doubled. The uptick started around five years ago and there has been no fall in the numbers since. There’s a lot of financial pressure on these students nowadays because of which they get into all sorts of things and even become victims of the same,” said Hansi.
Also, there are fund-raising portals such as ‘Go fund Me’, through which friends and relatives can take care of the expenses.
In July, young Gurvinder Nath, who had just started to work as a food delivery driver, became a victim of violent carjacking. He had brought a new car for his work, which was stolen while he was beaten up by the suspects, who are still on the run for three months. Nath later succumbed to injuries.
Nath’s distant relative in Canada, Jaswinder Singh Meelu, along with a few friends raised funds for his medical treatment while he was hospitalised and eventually for his funeral and repatriation.
“He was a young boy from my mother’s village back in Punjab. He came from a low-income family, who didn’t have any means to pay for these expenses. So, we thought to raise funds for him. Lakhs of such students like him come to Canada and even make it big here eventually. But the scenario post-pandemic has been such that there is an uptick in such deaths every single day,” said Meelu, 50, who himself came to Canada as a 17-year-old student in 1991.
He remembered that back in those days and even till like five years ago there was no such crises for housing or jobs. Now, students are in so much pressure to just somehow make it here that it is crushing them. Most of them are finally settling here, paying off the loan taken by their families and becoming permanent residents.
“They have a dream to live a life of dignity and comfort here. Parents need to realise that their children need to be safe first and just not get into this thought of sending them out at the cost of having to lose them,” said Meelu.
Meelu blamed the Canadian government for the plight of the Indian students. Despite an Indian student paying four-time fee than the average Canadian college student, the government does not realise that they are also the future of this country. The authorities have the responsibility for the mental health and well-being of these students.
Manan Gupta, Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant (RCIC-IRB) in Brampton, Ontario, said the number of deaths of students/working professionals in the 18-25 age-group have increased over the past few years since the influx of Indian students grew higher.
“There are around five to eight bodies being sent back to India every month. It’s a mixed bag and a deadly combination of so many factors at play from students being deeply anxious to find a house, a job and then to settle here while their savings are running out. They are young and vulnerable without a support system. It’s a challenge for the Canadian government since these numbers are high,” said Gupta.
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