On Amrit Kaur’s graduation day in June, “Bill 21” — a law that bans some civil servants in positions of authority from wearing religious symbols — came into force in Quebec, Canada’s French-speaking province.

Refusing to remove the turban she wears on a daily basis, the Sikh education graduate became instantly unemployable as a teacher in her home province. She has since moved 4,500km west to anglophone Surrey, British Columbia.

“If federal politicians really don’t want to see a Canada that’s racist, then do something about Bill 21,” said Ms Kaur, who also works with the World Sikh Organisation of Canada.

Ms Kaur’s reaction underlines how fraught an issue the bill, passed by the right-leaning Quebec government of Premier François Legault, has become in Canada’s fiercely contested federal election campaign.