Winnipeg's Sikh community prepares Valentine's Day care packages for women's centres

Members of Winnipeg's Sikh community gathered at the Valley Gardens Community Centre on Sunday to put together care packages that will be given to two women's centres for Valentine's Day.

"To spread some love and cheer on Valentine's Day, which is a day of love, we're creating care packages," Mahekleen Gill, an organizer of the event, told CBC News.

The care packages consist of personal care items, chocolates and personalized Valentine's Day cards, she said.

The event is a partnership between the World Sikh Organization of Canada and community organizations, taking place in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, Regina, Saskatoon, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver this year.

It is an annual event that was started by the Sikh community in 2012and is also part of the One Billion Risingmovement, which is based on a statistic that one in three women across the globe will face violence at some point in their lives.

It was the event's fifth year in Winnipeg, said Mahekleen, and is run entirely by volunteers.

"This would not be possible at all without them," she said.

Willow Place and the North Point Douglas Women's Centre in Winnipeg are the two shelters that will receive the packages. Local schools, daycares and community centres all chipped in with donations this year.

Mahekleen said they are hoping to expand the initiative to other shelters throughout the provincebut that depends on the amount of donations they receive.

"The more donations we get, the more we can go to more shelters."

Parminder Singh Gill, a volunteer at the event, said the pandemic made things challenging in terms of coordination in previous years.

"There was a lot of uncertainty during the pandemic about donations," he told CBC. "I would say this year was amazing because there was a bit of electricity in the air."

He said 15 volunteers showed up on Sunday, creating between 150 to 200 care packages. He saw volunteers from 2019 return, with many young women and boys also volunteering their time.

"To me, that's an indicator of success," he said.

Parminder said it is not a requirement to be Sikh in to participate in the initiative.

"There's a need for this in our society, and if we live together as neighbourswe want to make sure that we look out for one another as well."

The idea behind the initiative is to ensure women in need get the supplies they require and to also spread a message of empowerment and love.

The shelters "need support. They're actually asking for support," Parminder said.

"We acknowledge that, with the privilege that we have, there's folks out there using these resources because there's a need for it."