After a tragic summer, Harpreet hatched a plan to prevent drownings

In the same way learning to drive can help migrants enjoy the best opportunities Australia has to offer, Harpreet Singh Kandra says people settling here should also learn to swim

It’s a message that has particular importance for Victoria’s Indian community, which was rocked by multiple drownings last summer.

The Sikh community around Pakenham has partnered with a local pool operator and Life Saving Victoria to start a pilot adult swimming program.

Kandra, a community volunteer and senior lecturer in water engineering at Federation University, vowed he would learn how to swim not just for safety, but so he can enjoy playing in the water with his nine-year-old daughter.

He is now looking to bring many other adults with him via a pilot program being run in south-east Melbourne with Lifesaving Victoria and pool operator Aligned Leisure.

“I think we know the community needs to own the problem because it’s a skill that we should acquire,” he said, ahead of Saturday’s launch.

“When you come to Australia, you learn driving because it gives you bread and butter. In the same way, we need to learn swimming to be able to enjoy life [here].

The scheme will initially provide subsidised lessons for 20 adults, 10 men and 10 women, over a 10-week program.

The lessons were heavily subsidised by Aligned Leisure.

Additionally, Lifesaving Victoria strategic adviser for diversity David Holland said the organisation would provide incursions to community halls and places of worship as well as excursions to beaches and pools to improve water safety education.

Holland said Kandra’s program was unconventional in targeting adults, rather than children, who could influence the broader community’s attitudes towards swimming.

“If you can start to get influential adults in the Sikh community to learn to swim at their age it will encourage and inspire other adults but also their kids,” he said.

Holland said the community had been proactive in trying to boost water safety since a summer featuring a string of drowning deaths.

Gurjinder Singh and his son, Dharmvir, died in a Gold Coast pool while attempting to save a two-year-old girl who had fallen into the water. Another four people from India died at the Forrest Caves beach at Phillip Island while an Indian international student drowned at Apollo Bay.

Kandra said water safety was a huge issue for migrant groups with hundreds of thousands of immigrants in this country arriving here without an “established relationship with water”.

“We hope we will be able to motivate more people,” he said.

For Kandra, his daughter is thrilled her parents (Kandra’s wife is also participating in the lessons) will be able to join her in the water.