Edmonton Elks playing in first professional football game broadcast in Punjabi

The Edmonton Elks home game against the B.C. Lions on Saturday will be the first professional football game broadcast in Punjabi.

The Elks announced Tuesday that it is partnering with Edmonton multilingual radio station My Radio 580 AM to broadcast the CFL game across Alberta on radio and throughout Canada through the station’s online player.

Canada is home to a Punjabi population of roughly one million people, according to the 2021 Canadian census. Alberta has the third-largest Punjabi population among Canadian provinces at 126,385 people according to the census.

“Yeah, it’s a good it’s like a proud to the Punjabi too, because they can learn and they can play and different games instead of cricket. So they can like achieve a good name in football, too,” said Ravinder Kaur.

You can see it every year at the Vaisakhi Parade, the Punjabi population is growing in Alberta. According to Stats Canada, the country is home to a Punjabi population of roughly one million people and Alberta hosts the third largest Punjabi population in the country, with around 125 thousand residents.

British Columbia has the second-largest community at 315,000 people.

“We are very much entrusting to move here and in nowadays like in every field of life in Canada, Punjabis are involved. So this is good. It looks good. You know, this is a safe country, multi-national country, a multi community,” said Sarbgit Chema.

The Elks were also part of the first Indigenous language broadcast in CFL history last year when they partnered with Windspeaker Media to air a game against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in Cree.

In a statement, Elks president and CEO Victor Cui says, “We couldn’t think of a better matchup for our Punjabi broadcast, as we hope the broadcast is also enjoyed by the large Punjabi community in B.C.”

Sports broadcasters Harpreet Pandher and Taqdeer Thindal, who work on Hockey Night in Canada’s Punjabi crew, will call the game.