VANCOUVER - A memorial service is being held in Stanley Park tonight to mark the 29th anniversary of the June 23, 1985 Air India terrorist attack that left 331 dead.

Former Surrey-Tynehead MLA Dave Hayer said the service will begin at 6:30 p.m. at Ceperley Playground, where a memorial has been built with inscriptions of the names of the victims.

Air India Flight 182 exploded off the coast of Ireland after a B.C.-made bomb had been placed in a suitcase and loaded into a connecting flight in Vancouver, then transferred onto the ill-fated Boeing 747 in Toronto.

A second bomb was placed on a flight to Narita, Japan that was connecting with a second Air India flight. But it exploded prematurely, killing two Japanese baggage handlers about an hour before the other bombing.

Two B.C. Sikh separatist leaders were charged and later acquitted in the terrorist attack, which remains the worst mass murder in Canadian history.

A third man, Inderjit Singh Reyat, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was later convicted of perjury for lying as a Crown witness at the trial of the other two.

Families of the victims have gathered at the Stanley Park memorial since it was completed in 2007.

"These horrendous acts live on in the memories of all family members of the victims, and these annual memorial ceremonies continue to remind us all that terrorism has no place in a civilized world and that it must be stamped out at all costs," said Hayer, whose father was on the Air India witness list when he was murdered in 1998.

kbolan@vancouversun.com