[1] The largest South Asian Canadian communities are found in the provinces of Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta, while metropolitan areas with large populations include Toronto (1,182,485), Vancouver (369,295), Calgary (153,200), Edmonton (123,340), and Montréal (121,260).

[13]: 332 The first well-known record of Canadians from South Asia dates back to 1897, when Punjabi Sikh soldiers arrived in British Columbia while transiting from India to the United Kingdom during the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria.

[14] With an estimated population of 100 by 1900,[14] further South Asian settlement waves to Canada occurred in the few years after the turn of the 20th century; after hearing stories about the high wages being paid in British Columbia, some Punjabi British Indian soldiers stationed in Hong Kong and other British-controlled Chinese cities emigrated to Canada and settled in the western province.

[18] In 1907, the government in British Columbia enacted laws limiting the rights and privileges of Canadians from South Asian countries, which prevented them from voting and denied them access to holding political office, public sector jobs and other professions,[19] which prompted many to migrate south from Vancouver across the border to the United States, where some became the victims of the 1907 Bellingham riots.

The second Gurdwara to be built in Canada was in 1908 in Kitsilano (Vancouver) and aimed at serving a growing number of Punjabi Sikh settlers who worked at nearby sawmills along False Creek at the time.

A notable example of early anti-South Asian sentiments as a result of continuous journey regulation in Canada was the Komagata Maru incident.

[61]A millwright and union official, and known as a sportsman and humanitarian philanthropist as well as a lumberman, Grewall eventually established himself as one of the largest employers and most influential business leaders in the northern Fraser Valley, owned six sawmills and was active in community affairs serving on the boards or as chairman of a variety of organizations, and was instrumental in helping create Mission's municipal tree farm.

[59][61][62][63][64] With strong pro-labour beliefs despite his role as a mill-owner, after a scandal embroiled the provincial Ministry of Forestry under the-then Social Credit party government, he referred to holders of forest management licenses across British Columbia as Timber Maharajahs, and cautioned that within a decade, three or four giant corporations would predominantly control the entire industry in the province, echoing similarities to the archaic zamindar system in South Asia.

[63][64] While by the 1950s, South Asian Canadians had gained respect in business in British Columbia primarily for their work in owning sawmills and aiding the development of the provincial forestry industry, racism still existed especially in the upper echelons of society.

[62][65] As such, during the campaign period and in the aftermath of running for MLA in 1956, Grewall received personal threats, while the six mills he owned along with his house were all set ablaze by arsonists.

[a]Beginning in the 1960s racial and national restrictions were removed from Canada's immigration policies resulting in the explosive growth of South Asian community.

Discrimination in many African Great Lakes nations like Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania against Indians was growing as a result of their status as a market-dominant minority.

Around this time the Indo-Caribbeans (mainly from Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago, as well as some from Suriname, Jamaica, and other Caribbean nations) Indo-Fijians, Indo-South Africans, and Indo-Mauritians began immigrating to Canada as well, settling mainly in Toronto, Ontario.

Prior to the wide-scale urbanization of the South Asian Canadian community, the most statistically significant populations existed across rural British Columbia; a legacy of previous waves of immigration and settlement patterns that existed earlier in the 20th century through until the latter quarter of the century, as Punjabi Canadians continued to seek employment in the provincial forestry sector at sawmills throughout Vancouver Island and the interior.

In addition to the South Asians still arriving from other parts of the world like the Persian Gulf, the Caribbean, the African Great Lakes, and Fiji.

Sihota, who was born in Duncan, British Columbia in 1955, ran as the NDP candidate in the riding of Esquimalt-Port Renfrew two years after being involved in municipal politics, as he was elected as an Alderman for the city of Esquimalt in 1984.

These protests reached their peak in 1984 when the Indian Army raided the Golden Temple, which was followed by the assassination of then–Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards and finally by anti-Sikh riots throughout North India.

On June 23, 1985, several Canadian Sikhs led by Talwinder Singh Parmar were arrested for the Air India Flight 182 bombing, which killed 329 people.

Several other notable places of worship have been built by Canadians from South Asia including the Khalsa Darbar Gurdwara and Baitul Islam mosque.

In 2011 the 12th International Indian Film Academy Awards were hosted in Toronto, which was home to nearly 832,000 Canadians of South Asian ancestry, one of the largest in the Western World.

By 1961, right before racial restriction were respectfully removed from Canada's immigration policy, Canadians of South Asian descent rose to 6,774.

With racial quotas being removed (invitations extended) during the 1960s the number of Canadians of South Asian ancestry created the diverse population we see into the present day.

[82] This marked the first time in census records where Sikhs did not form the largest religious group amongst Canadians with South Asian ancestry.

Based on a 2007 report, Indo-Canadians are split between Sikhs (34%) and Hindus (27%), Muslims (17%), Christians (16%), Irreligious (4%), with Jains, Buddhists, and Zoroastrians forming the remaining 2%.

[e] Religion is found to play an important part in the lives of many Canadians from South Asia and serves as defining point in their identity, as with many people.

For example, in British Columbia, adherents of Sikhism are the largest religious group amongst the South Asian community, a legacy of chain migration stemming from nearly 130 years of settlement and immigration to the western province.

With the diversity in religious affiliation across the provinces and territories of Canada amongst individuals of South Asian descent, metropolitan areas follow a similar trend.

Attributed to the large increase in immigration during the era, Ontario overtook British Columbia by 1971 as the province with the largest population of individuals with South Asian ancestry in Canada.

According to the 2021 census, metropolitan areas with large South Asian Canadian communities include Toronto (1,182,485), Vancouver (369,295), Calgary (153,200), Edmonton (123,340), Montréal (121,260), Winnipeg (63,805), and Ottawa (60,780).

In addition immigrants to Canada arrive from regions such as the Arab States of the Persian Gulf, the Caribbean and the African Great Lakes (as well as European countries).