As of August 2024:
Messenger will no longer be hosted by SFU Library. Contact the Multicultural History Society of Ontario to arrange on-site access at the MHSO Archives.
Because of immigration restrictions on South Asians, Canada’s Pakistani communities did not begin to be established until well into the 1960s. According to the Encyclopedia of Canada’s Peoples, "When the 1951 quota system that provided places for 100 Pakistanis was replaced with a point system in 1967, the number of Pakistani settlers rapidly increased, approaching 50,000 by the mid-1980s." The majority of this group of new immigrants settled in Toronto and Montreal.
To serve this growing community, several Urdu-language newspapers sprang up in the Toronto area. The Messenger was published from 1978 to 1992, almost entirely in Urdu. It usually appeared twice a month (although publication was at times irregular). It concerned itself with Pakistan-Canada relations, particularly trade and technological cooperation, as well as Pakistan’s political situation. Many issues include English-language pages, but the majority of the text is in Urdu. Available here are the years 1978 to 1984.
Contributed by Multicultural History Society of Ontario.