Canada: 5 Indo-Canadians elected as Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives win third term

Toronto: Five Indo-Canadians were elected to the Ontario legislature on Thursday as provincial elections saw the ruling Progressive Conservative Party return to power for a third consecutive term.

The term of the Ontario legislature was till the summer of 2026, but Premier (equivalent of a Chief Minister in India) Doug Ford called for snap polls last month, arguing his government needed a strong mandate to deal with the threat of tariffs from the Administration of US President Donald Trump.

While that was the reason given, there were numerous reports Ford was considering early elections even before Trump returned to power in November.

However, the Ontario election was the first to be held in Canada under the shadow of the tariff threat and Ford was criticised by the opposition for making two official visits to Washington during the campaign period.

In the final accounting, the ruling party looked on course to securing a comfortable majority, with about 80 seats, as some results remained too close to call. While it recorded nearly 43 per cent support, the Conservatives will, however, fall short of the 83 seats it won in the 2022 election.

The NDP will return as the principal opposition party with about 25 seats and 19 per cent vote share. The Liberals tallied 13 seats and 30% support. There are 124 seats in Ontario’s provincial parliament and the majority mark is 63.

Ford first came into power in 2018, after he led his party in ousting the Liberal Pary which had ruled Ontario for the previous 15 years.

After securing a third consecutive term as leader of Canada’s most populous province, Ford posted on X, “The people have spoken and they’re standing up for Canada!”

Among the Indo-Canadian winners was Prabhmeet Sarkaria, currently the Minister of Transportation. Sarkaria won Brampton South with 53% of the vote, besting Liberal candidate Bhavik Parikh who had just over 32%.

Another victor was Associate Minister of Housing Nina Tangri, who retained the riding (as a constituency is called in Canada) of Mississauga-Streetsville with nearly 48% support.

Others to win included Hardeep Grewal from Brampton East, Amarjot Sandhu from Brampton West and Deepak Anand from Mississauga-Malton.

Each of them won from ridings in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and except Grewal, the rest had their third consecutive win.

Grewal entered politics in 2022 and became a member of the provincial parliament or MPP after securing a significant victory over the New Democratic Party’s Gurratan Singh, brother of NDP’s federal leader Jagmeet Singh.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau congratulated Ford on his win. In a message, he said, “At this crucial time, we must work together to defend Canadian interests, protect workers and businesses, and grow our economy.”