RCMP changes its dress code to allow turbans

Who: Baltej Singh Dhillon, a Sikh raised in Malaysia who came to British Columbia in 1983, and the federal government of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, whose Solicitor General, Pierre Cadieux, announced the change. The World Sikh Organization of Canada took the lead in the legal defence of the turban, says the Sikh Heritage Museum of Canada.

What: Dhillon applied to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 1988 and met the entry requirements, but the dress code of the time banned turbans and required clean-shaven faces, which conflicted with his faith (The Canadian Encyclopedia). He was asked to give up the turban for the standard peaked cap or Stetson and refused (Sikh Heritage Museum of Canada). The accounts differ on the RCMP's own advice. The Museum says that in April 1989 the commissioner recommended a prohibition against turbans; The Canadian Encyclopedia says the commissioner recommended lifting the ban on beards and turbans; Wikipedia says Commissioner Norman Inkster sided with Dhillon and pressed the government to change the policy.

A national and often hostile debate followed, with protests and threats against Dhillon's life (Sikh Heritage Museum of Canada). Wikipedia says more than 150,000 people signed petitions to keep the old dress code. Some municipalities in western Canada that contracted RCMP policing condemned the plan and other critics went to court (The Canadian Encyclopedia). Sikh leaders answered that turbaned Sikhs had served in the British Indian Army in both World Wars (Wikipedia).

On 15 March 1990 the Solicitor General announced that the RCMP dress code would be amended so that a turbaned Sikh could join the force (Sikh Heritage Museum of Canada; South Asian Canadian Heritage). Wikipedia dates the announcement in the House of Commons to 16 March. By 1996 the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the Federal Court and the Supreme Court of Canada had all upheld the government's decision (The Canadian Encyclopedia).

Where: Ottawa, where the announcement was made, and the RCMP's training Depot in Regina, where Dhillon trained and graduated in 1991 as the first RCMP officer to wear a turban (Sikh Heritage Museum of Canada; Prime Minister's Office).

Why it mattered: It made the dastar part of the uniform of Canada's national police force. The Museum records that the Metropolitan Toronto Police had already changed its rules in 1986 to let practising Sikh officers wear turbans, beards and long hair. Dhillon served about 30 years in the RCMP, including work on the Air India Flight 182 investigation, and was named to the Senate of Canada on 7 February 2025, the Prime Minister's Office reports.