1. Satinder Kaur "Sindi" Hawkins was a Canadian politician who served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, representing Okanagan West from 1996 to 2001 and Kelowna-Mission from 2001 to 2009.
15 Facts About Sindi Hawkins
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Sindi Hawkins was the first Punjabi woman elected to a Canadian legislature, and the first Indo-Canadian woman provincial cabinet minister.
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Sindi Hawkins was born Satinder Kaur Ahluwalia in New Delhi; her father Manohar Singh Ahluwalia was a communications officer under Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
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Sindi Hawkins moved to Canada with her family at age 5, settling in Sturgis, Saskatchewan.
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Sindi Hawkins attended the School of Nursing of Foothills Hospital and the University of Calgary, graduating with a BN in 1988, and eventually became head nurse at the Tom Baker Cancer Centre in Calgary.
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Sindi Hawkins held a post-graduate certificate in neuroscience nursing from the Montreal Neurological Hospital, becoming one of the first nurses in Canada to be certified in the discipline by the Canadian Nurses Association, and served as head nurse of neurosurgery at Foothills Hospital.
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Sindi Hawkins then earned a law degree from the University of Calgary in 1994, was called to the British Columbia Bar in 1995, and set up her own company as a lawyer with an interest in medical-legal issues.
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Sindi Hawkins ran as a BC Liberal candidate in the 1996 provincial election, and was elected MLA in the riding of Okanagan West.
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Sindi Hawkins was re-elected in 2001 in the redistributed riding of Kelowna-Mission by a margin of 12,285 votes, and was appointed to the cabinet that June by Premier Gordon Campbell to serve as Minister of Health Planning.
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Sindi Hawkins's position was abolished in a January 2004 cabinet shuffle, and she was re-assigned as Minister of State for Intergovernmental Relations.
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In 2004, Sindi Hawkins was diagnosed with leukemia and waged a high-profile battle with the illness; she was saved as a result of a bone marrow transplant from her sister.
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Sindi Hawkins campaigned for cancer research and bone marrow donation awareness.
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On November 17,2008, Sindi Hawkins announced that she would not run for re-election in 2009.
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Sindi Hawkins began treatment for leukemia for the third time in March 2009.
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Sindi Hawkins died on September 21,2010 at her eldest sister's home in Calgary, a week after her 52nd birthday.