Deep Saini
Canadian scientist, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of McGill University
Hargurdeep Saini (Punjabi: ਹਰਗੁਰਦੀਪ ਸੈਣੀ) is an Indian-Canadian scientist and university administrator. He is the president and vice-chancellor of McGill University in Montreal. He was previously the president and vice-chancellor of Dalhousie University, a vice-chancellor and president of University of Canberra, and a vice-president of the University of Toronto and principal of its Mississauga campus.
Early life and education
Saini was born in 1954 in Punjab, India, to a family from Nawanshahr where he grew up. He completed his Bachelor of Science (Honours) and Master of Science (Honours) in botany from Punjab Agricultural University in Ludhiana. He then moved to Australia, where he earned his Ph.D. in plant physiology from the University of Adelaide, followed by a postdoctoral research fellowship at the University of Alberta in Canada.
Career
Saini began his academic career at the Université de Montréal, where he spent 18 years as a professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, later serving as the director general of the Institut de recherche en biologie végétale (Plant Biology Research Institute) from 1996-2001.
He then moved on to leadership roles at other Canadian universities, including dean of the Faculty of Environment (formerly Environmental Studies) at the University of Waterloo, as well as the dual role of principal of the University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM) and vice-president of the University of Toronto. During his time as vice-president and principal of UTM from 2010 to 2016, Saini oversaw the expansion of program offerings and several multi-million-dollar construction projects on the campus, notably the development and launch of the Mississauga Academy of Medicine in 2011 and opening of the Innovation Complex in 2014.
In 2016, he relocated to Australia to take on the role of vice-chancellor and president of the University of Canberra.
“Deep Saini” enters the record as canadian scientist, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of McGill University. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Deep, Saini and Canadian can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q16875250. VIAF identifies the subject as 105622861. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1954, 1996, 2001 and 2010.
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This entry incorporates text from “Deep Saini” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.