Diaspora: Shiv “Veera” inducted into Hall of Fame of City of Coquitlam

He is an icon, an institution, a player, a coach and a thinker, all rolled into one. He is none other than Shiv Jagday, “Veera” to all who feel passionate about an Indian sport  that traces its roots to  Great Britain.

Once Indians embraced it, hockey became synonymous with the South Asians in general and Punjabis in particular.

It has travelled with Indian expatriates all over the globe. It is one reason that teams on almost all continents had  at some stage been represented by one or more players or coaches of Indian descent.And one of them has been Shiv Jagday. He may not have played in the Olympics himself but has  the consolation of seeing his son, Ronnie, represent Canada in the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games.

An FIH recognised coach, Shiv Jagday enjoys the rare distinction of coaching both Canada (1982-86)  and USA (1998-2005) national hockey teams.

When Pargat Singh was Director of  Sports, Punjab, and Sukhvir Grewal was rebuilding Punjab hockey through various academies all over the State,  Shiv Jagday visited  his motherland and organised orientation courses and clinics for Punjab hockey coaches.

Recognition has come for 73-year-young “Shiv Veera”, the Head Coach behin Field  Hockey  Canada’s first Pan-American Games gold medal winner team. He has been  inducted into  City of Coquitlam’s Hall of Fame. It may be pertinent to mention that in 2020, Shiv “Veera” was inducted into the Field Hockey Canada’s Hall of Fame in the coach category.

Shiv Jagday, notable for his selfless dedication to growing the sport, grew up in Ludhiana, a small town in Punjab. As a young boy, Jagday was surrounded by field hockey royalty and decided that he wanted to take the sport seriously in his teenage years.

 A product of Malwa Khalsa School, Jagday’s abilities as an on-field player took him all the way to the university level, where he was among the last players to be cut from the national team. That moment became a turning point. He knew he wanted to reach the highest level of the game. But he switched gears and went on to carve a path for himself and contribute to the sport as a coach.

Olympian and penalty king of the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games, Prithipal Singh, the sports director for Jagday’s Punjab Agricultural University, gave him an opportunity to show his stripes as a coach. After a little while coaching, Jagday then moved to Canada through his wife, Harjit.

It was in Canada where he became a field hockey coach for the University of British Columbia, and word began to spread about his hockey knowledge.

Word got out to Victor Warren, who was then the president of Field Hockey Canada, and he hired Jagday as a coach. This moment was the beginning of some ground-breaking accomplishments for team Canada.

“I had a belief system that if I could teach these young players what I know, why can’t they be the best in the world?” said Jagday. “And I came with that mindset.”

In the following years, Jagday led multiple generations of National Teams to notable accomplishments.

The junior men’s national team qualified for its first World Cup appearance in 1982 and finished a national best-8th place. Canada won the gold medal at the Pan-American Games for the first time in 1983

Canada qualified for the Olympics for the first time in eight years in 1984.  After his time with Team Canada, Coach Shiv continued to coach and lead in different capacities at the international level until 2005. During this period, he also remained associated with the US national hockey team.

Since then, he has dedicated his life to giving back to the game by continuing to coach at the local and regional level and spreading his hockey knowledge to many people through online sessions and videos. His current goal is to integrate different positive aspects from other sports and see the game of field hockey evolve.

“I want to give back to sport, what sport has given to me. More than that. I want to be a human and treat everyone with love and respect,” said Jagday. “If you treat people with respect and love, it’ll come tenfold.”

Coach Shiv credits his faith, his family, Victor Warren, John McBryde, and his players for helping him get to where he is today.

Congratulations, Shiv “Veera” for being inducted into  his own city’s Hall of Fame.

Prabhjot Singh