Forty years after the bombing of Air India Flight 182, half of Canadians say the country has still not treated the incident as a true national tragedy, according to new research from the Angus Reid Institute.On June 23, 1985, a bomb exploded on board the flight en route from Canada to London, killing all 329 people on board, including 280 Canadian citizens. Despite being the worst terrorist attack in Canadian history, public awareness remains low. .Just 17% of Canadians were able to correctly identify the Air India bombing as the deadliest act of terrorism in the country’s history. Only 9% said they knew a lot about the incident, while 32% reported they had never even heard of it.The findings point to a deeper sense of national neglect. Asked whether the tragedy has been truly treated as a Canadian one, 51% said no, while only 17% believed it had. Another 32% were unsure. Among those who said they knew a lot about the bombing, 60% felt Canada has failed to recognize it as a national tragedy..Still, most Canadians appear willing to support efforts to change that. The survey found that 66% of respondents support adding information about the bombing to school curricula. Meanwhile, 71% would back the creation of a dedicated exhibit in the Canadian Museum of History to commemorate the victims.In both this year’s poll and similar data collected in 2023, fewer than 30% of Canadians said they believed enough has been done to honour the victims of the bombing.More details and complete poll results are available at www.angusreid.org.
