A yr after Sikh separatist chief Hardeep Singh Nijjar was killed outdoors a group shrine close to Vancouver, a collection of diplomatic and authorized measures is sharpening the scrutiny on India’s alleged function in quashing abroad Sikh separatist actions via assassinations in each america and Canada.
In Canada, an upcoming listening to on the Nijjar case on June 25 will provide prosecutors a brand new probability to current proof to again their allegations of India’s involvement within the homicide.
In the meantime, Nikhil Gupta, suspected of being concerned in a plot to kill Sikh separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, was extradited from the Czech Republic to the US earlier this month.
Right here is extra about what Canada and the US are doing – and what it means for India:
What’s occurring in Canada with the Nijjar case?
4 Indian nationals have been arrested in Might this yr over the deadly capturing of Nijjar in June final yr. The 4 males are Amandeep Singh, 22; Kamalpreet Singh, 22; Karan Brar, 22; and Karanpreet Singh, 28.
Sikh activists marked the primary anniversary of Nijjar’s demise by holding a mock trial of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi outdoors the Indian consulate in downtown Vancouver. They carried an effigy of Modi in jail stripes, asserting the Indian authorities’s function in Nijjar’s demise.
In the meantime, the Canadian Parliament final week honoured Nijjar on the anniversary of his assassination with a second of silence – sparking an indignant response from India. Nijjar, 45, was deemed a terrorist by the Indian authorities three years earlier than his demise.
Sikhs in Canada are persevering with to carry non-binding referendums on the creation of a separate Sikh nation out of India’s Punjab state, with the following vote scheduled on July 28 in Calgary, the Canadian Broadcasting Company reported.
The 4 males accused of involvement in Nijjar’s homicide will seem in a court docket listening to on June 25 within the metropolis of Surrey.
How has Nijjar’s case strained India-Canada ties?
Nijjar was shot useless outdoors a Sikh temple in Surrey in Canada’s British Columbia on June 18, 2023. Surrey has numerous Sikhs, who make up 2 % of Canada’s inhabitants.
Nijjar was related to the Khalistan motion, an ethnoreligious motion that sprung up among the many Sikhs in India, who make up 2 % of India’s inhabitants however practically 60 % of the inhabitants within the northern state of Punjab.
Khalistan is the proposed identify for a Sikh nation envisioned by some Sikhs, incorporating the state of Punjab in addition to different Punjabi-speaking areas of northern India.
Whereas the motion died down after a crescendo in India within the Nineteen Seventies and early Nineteen Eighties, because of a crackdown by Indian forces and Hindu mobs, it has just lately seen a resurgence amongst Sikhs within the diaspora.
In September 2023, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau mentioned that Canada was probing the chance that India’s authorities was concerned in Nijjar’s assassination. India has rejected any involvement in Nijjar’s demise.
The incident put a pressure on the connection between the 2 international locations, with India withdrawing its diplomats from Canada and briefly suspending visas for Canadians. Commerce talks between the nations have been in deep freeze since Trudeau’s bombshell allegations.
Final week on the G7 convention in Italy, Modi and Trudeau shook fingers, but it surely was unclear whether or not they mentioned India’s potential involvement in Nijjar’s demise.
The tensions are usually not prone to abate anytime quickly, particularly with hearings into the Nijjar case anticipated to disclose extra about Canada’s accusations in opposition to India. The Modi authorities has repeatedly accused Trudeau of pandering to Sikh separatists within the seek for their votes, ignoring Indian nationwide safety issues.
That criticism emerged once more final week, after the Canadian Parliament’s mark of respect for Nijjar. “Time once more, we’ve mentioned that Khalistani actions are a matter of significant concern for us. We have now been repeatedly calling upon the federal government of Canada to take motion. Political house supplied to extremist anti-India parts and people advocating violence should cease they usually should take motion,” India’s Ministry of Exterior Affairs Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal mentioned.
India claims that Canada has not but supplied it with any clear proof linking Nijjar’s assassination to Indian brokers. New Delhi has insinuated {that a} rivalry between legal gangs in Canada might have been behind the killing.
What is occurring within the US?
However Canada is just not the one nation the place the abroad actions of Indian safety companies are below scrutiny.
The Czech Republic has extradited Indian nationwide Nikhil Gupta to the US, the place prosecutors have accused him of involvement in an unsuccessful murder-for-hire plot to kill Sikh separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun.
Gupta, 53, who was arrested final yr in June by Czech authorities whereas travelling from India to Prague, reached the US on June 14.
Very like within the Nijjar case, the Indian authorities has sought to dissociate itself from the plot in opposition to Pannun. Nonetheless, it has mentioned it’s going to formally examine safety issues raised by Washington.
Final month, Washington mentioned it was happy up to now with India’s strikes to make sure accountability within the alleged plots whereas including that many steps nonetheless wanted to be taken.
Gupta, who has been held within the Metropolitan Detention Middle in Brooklyn, New York, since his arrival to the US, pleaded not responsible on June 17.
What was the Gurpatwant Singh Pannun case?
On November 29, 2023, the US Justice Division introduced fees in opposition to Gupta, accusing him of working for the Indian authorities to hold out the deliberate assassination of Pannun, who’s a US citizen, in New York.
Federal prosecutors described Gupta as an affiliate of an Indian authorities company worker recognized solely as “CC-1”, who beforehand labored with the Central Reserve Police Drive, a number one Indian authorities paramilitary pressure, the indictment said.
The indictment alleged that CC-1 directed the homicide plan from India and recruited Gupta round Might 2023 to coordinate it.
Gupta, on CC-1’s course, contacted an individual whom he believed was a legal affiliate who may perform the assassination, the indictment alleged. However the particular person he reached out to was, unknown to Gupta, working confidentially for US regulation enforcement.
This supply in flip related him to a “hitman” who was truly an undercover regulation enforcement officer, working for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), mentioned the indictment.
Gupta agreed to pay the hitman $100,000 for killing Pannun, paying him an advance of $15,000 in money in Manhattan round June 9, 2023, in line with the US Justice Division.
If convicted, Gupta can withstand 20 years in jail.
The DEA, in addition to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), are probing this case, in line with a Justice Division press launch on June 17.
Are the tremors being felt elsewhere?
The Australian Broadcasting Company (ABC) just lately printed an article accusing Indian brokers of harassing and threatening members of the Sikh diaspora in Australia, and linking these circumstances to Nijjar’s assassination in addition to the alleged plot within the US concentrating on Pannun.
The ABC has beforehand reported on Australia expelling an alleged “nest of spies” from India. Its reporting means that brokers from the Australian Safety Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), the home intelligence company, met with Sikh activists in Australia relating to Nijjar’s demise.
The ABC has mentioned that YouTube blocked a few of its in India forward of the nation’s basic election. YouTube mentioned the ban was following a “confidential” order which got here below India’s Info Know-how Act of 2000.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese – who in Might 2023 had feted Modi in Australia, evaluating his recognition to that of iconic singer Bruce Springsteen – or his authorities has not commented on the ABC experiences.
