Surrey's Sikh Youth on CBC's The Current

Go to the CBC website to listen to the entire interview. Here's the description from the site:

Sikh Temple - President

When a slate of young candidates in Surrey, British Columbia decided to run for the leadership of one of the biggest Sikh Temples in North America, they didn't mess around. They ran an Obama-styled campaign based on the slogan of "Change." And they embraced the internet with video appeals to reform the Gurdwara ... or Sikh temple.

The candidates on the Sikh Youth slate ran on a platform with plenty of big promises. Change from the old, moderate leadership to one that's more traditionally religious ... Change from an old generation to a younger one ... And perhaps most importantly, change that would put a specific focus on tackling the drugs, gangs, and violence that they say are tearing their community apart.

Those messages brought out an overwhelming number of voters and pushed the Sikh Youth slate to victory. They will take over the leadership at the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara on January 1st. That's the same temple where, 12 years ago, a violent riot broke out over the issue of allowing tables and chairs into the Temple... a debate that's now history according to our next guest. Today, he says, the Surrey's Sikh Community has bigger priorities like its' youth. Bikramjit Singh Sandhar is the Temple's newly elected President and he was in Surrey, B.C.

Sikh Temple - Panel

For their thoughts on the Temple's new leadership and its prospects for curbing gang activity and youth violence, we were joined by two people. Jagdeep Singh Mangat is a community activist and a law student in Vancouver. And Indira Prahst is a Sociologist at Langara College in Vancouver. She is also a member of The South Asian Community Coalition Against Youth Violence.

The Surrey School Board is trying to steer young people away from gangs too. It has partnered with local police and run a number of programs that reach out to kids -- especially at-risk kids -- in their schools. The CBC's Meera Bains paid a visit to one of those programs led by Rob Rai who works as a Youth Diversity Liaison for the Surrey School Board. We heard from him as well as some of the grade nine students attending his youth gang violence workshop.