This rural N.S. temple is one of North America's oldest, and it's celebrating its 50th Diwali

The Aulds Cove Hindu temple sits in a picturesque spot, overlooking the ocean near the Canso causeway linking mainland Nova Scotia to Cape Breton. The tiny community of Aulds Cove, N.S., numbers its population in the dozens, and it's an unlikely place to find one of the oldest Hindu temples in North America. 

The temple was conceived at a Diwali function in 1969 and officially opened during Diwali celebrations in 1972, according to the late Yogi Joshi, a founder who wrote about the history of the temple in 2008. 

Fifty years later, the temple is still celebrating Diwali, one of the most important festivals in the Hindu calendar.

Anu Joshi, Yogi Joshi's widow, made the trip on Saturday to the temple that stands as a symbol of community and a tribute to its founders.

She said returning to the temple was bittersweet and brought back memories of her late husband, a physicist, who worked hard to make the temple a reality. 

"I find it rather difficult to go to the temple and that's why I'm going with the support of my friends," she said. "It's kind of heartbreaking. It takes me back emotionally."

She said her husband would ask people, especially those in the Indian community, to make a donation to the temple whenever he travelled for conferences.

She said most people he asked were surprised to learn there was a temple in a rural area of Nova Scotia, about 230 kilometres northeast of Halifax. 

Joshi said the temple is thought to be one of the oldest in North America — the oldest Hindu temple in Toronto, for instance, only dates back to 1979. The Aulds Cove temple was built on its present site because an Indian doctor in the Port Hawkesbury area donated the land.

She said Indians were a small and visible group in the area at the time and one of the first questions people in the wider community asked was if they attended church.

She said when people in the area learned that they had a temple, it gave them standing in the community.

"These people, even though they are different in colour, they look different, they have a different name — they have a temple, they believe in God," she said.

In her late husband's history of the temple, he tells a story about a devotional statue, known as a murti, used at the official opening of the temple.

Krishan Lekhi, one of the temple's founding members, was asked to lend an expensive marble statue of Lord Krishna for the official ceremony, which he did.

After the function, temple members told Lekhi that Murti Sathapna had taken place  — a ritual that turns the object into a manifestation of the deity — and he could not take the statue back.

A gracious Lekhi not only donated his statue but also gave $200 to build a platform for it to sit on. 

Pandit Ravi Dogra officiated at the first Diwali celebration and travelled from his current home in Toronto to attend this year's observance.

He said in 50 years, he has only missed being physically present for Diwali celebrations at the temple around five times. 

He said he vividly remembers the excitement of the devotees assembled for the opening.

"I could see the glow in their eyes — beautiful," he said. "Everybody was so enthusiastic and and so willing to sing the praises of the almighty and saying, 'Thank God, you have given us this beautiful place to to come.'"

Dogra said people used to visit the temple from as far away as Newfoundland in the early days.

Community is aging

He said many, like himself, have migrated from the area. With many members of the community aging, they are finding it difficult to travel to the temple.  

According to Joshi, while the number of permanent residents has dwindled, an influx of Indian university students has bolstered the numbers.

She said there were over 2,000 Indian students in the Sydney area two years ago.

"There are a lot of Indian students and they all want to go to the temple because they feel a connection with the country," Joshi said.

Sanjana Sridharan, a Halifax-based psychiatrist and the secretary for the temple, said she was gratified by the turnout on Saturday that included seven St. Francis Xavier University students from Antigonish, a 40-minute drive from Aulds Cove.

Saturday's temple events included a pooja (a Hindu worship ritual), a communal meal, the lighting of Diwali lamps and daytime fireworks.