Mohinder Grewal - Director

Prior to immigrating to Canada in1977, Mohinder Grewal pursued a successful military career in Malaysia after graduating from the Royal Military Academy in Sandhurst, England. He is the recipient of the Ahli Mangku Negara and Kesatria Mangku Negara (equivalent to the British awards of MBE and OBE respectively) from the Malaysian monarchy.

Both through his work, but most especially through his numerous volunteer activities, Mohinder has dedicated his life in Canada to the well-being of immigrants and Visible Minorities, and to a just society in which all are welcome. He has worked in the area of race relations, immigrant services and cultural and social policy development and served as a member of the Convention Refugee Determination Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. He has served on many boards and committees that safeguard the well-being of immigrants and Visible Minorities in general. One such advisory body was the National Cross-Cultural Round-Table on Security, appointed in 2005, jointly by the Federal Ministers of Justice and the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister responsible for Public Security.

At present he is a member of the Global Television Network Diversity Committee, the Richmond Intercultural Advisory Committee, the Provincial Committee on Diversity and Policing and the National Visible Minority Council on Labour Force Development of which he is the vice-chair. Mohinder has also served on the Boards of Committee for Racial Justice and Vancouver Multicultural Society. He has served his own faith, the Indo-Canadian community and ethno-cultural communities in his capacity as executive director of the Sikh Professional Association of Canada, as president of the National Association of Canadians of Origin in India (NACOI) and as a member of Board of Directors, Canadian Ethno-cultural Council. As the President of NACOI, he presented briefs to the Federal Parliamentary Committees on issues such as Employment Equity.

 His involvement with seniors’ issues spans from his days as vice-chair of the B.C. Seniors Advisory Council, the steering committee member for the United Nations’ International Year of the Older Person on the Canada Co-ordinating Committee, a recent term on the BC Premier’s Council on Aging and Seniors’ Issues and a member of BC Regional Review Committee for the New Horizons grant for Seniors. He serves as a member on the Richmond Seniors’ Advisory Committee, and is on the Board of Directors of Vancouver Cross-Cultural Seniors’ Network Society.

In 2007, in recognition of his “outstanding contribution to the promotion of Multiculturalism in BC” he was chosen by Affiliation of Multicultural Societies and Service Agencies of BC (AMSSA) to receive the Riasat Ali Khan Diversity Award.

In 2009 he was elected as a director of Richmond Addiction Services.