The Story Behind the Archive
The archive was conceptualized and initiated by Dr. Chandrima Chakraborty, inspired by Mr. Rattan Singh Kalsi, who lost his 19-year-old daughter, Indira, in the bombing. During an interview, Mr. Kalsi expressed a profound desire to share his story with a broader public and offered to donate a substantial collection of materials related to Flight 182 that he had preserved over many years. Other family members voiced similar commitments.
In response, the archive was developed in close collaboration with families who lost loved ones on Flight 182. Dr. Chakraborty works directly with surviving relatives, friends, and community members to collect testimonies and family-held historical materials connected to the tragedy. She leads a small, dedicated team of McMaster University students who are actively engaged in preserving these donated materials and employing new, open-access digital technologies to make them accessible to a global public.
The creation and ongoing development of the archive has been supported by funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and institutional partnerships with McMaster University Library’s William Ready Division of Archives and Research Collections, the Sherman Centre for Digital Scholarship, and the Faculty of Humanities.
Expandable List
The Air India Flight 182 bombing is extensively documented in official archives generated through investigations, court proceedings, and public inquiry records in Canada, alongside recovery-related records in Ireland. While essential, these materials largely frame the tragedy as an act of terror and do not fully capture the lived experiences of those affected.
The Air India Flight 182 Archive offers a different approach by valuing both the evidential and affective dimensions of records. Through donated photographs, letters, personal objects, testimonies, and artworks, it foregrounds histories of love, loss, grief, resilience, and collective memory, creating a public record centered on mourning, survival, community care and ongoing demands for justice.
The Air India Flight 182 Archive seeks to preserve the lives and memories of those lost while challenging the injustices of silence, erasure, and public forgetting. It offers a form of memory justice by recognizing and honouring experiences often excluded from official records.
By valuing what families and friends hold meaningful—stories, artefacts, and acts of remembrance—the archive creates space for contributors to speak in their own voices and shape a more inclusive historical record. It also serves as a site for public education, memorialization, and dialogue, supporting research, advocacy, and community engagement in Canada and globally, while reshaping how this history is remembered and understood.
Information Box Group
Archive Preview View Here
A selection of the diverse materials housed in the Air India Flight 182 Archive
Public Digital Exhibit View Here
Do you wish to make a statement? A digital exhibit on the Commission of Inquiry into the Investigation of the Bombing of Air India Flight 182
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Share your knowledge, volunteer, or donate to the Air India Flight 182 Archive
News Coverage
McMaster professor helps Canadians understand 1985 Air India bombing as part of our history Read More
By Wade Hemsworth, June 20, 2025