New Delhi: On Tuesday morning in New Delhi, Canadian High Commissioner to India Cameron MacKay was summoned by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA). MacKay walked into the MEA office somewhere around 10: 20 am and within minutes was seen leaving with a sullen look on his face, refusing to answer the media persons who quizzed him about what transpired.
MEA says, “The High Commissioner of Canada to India was summoned today and informed about the decision of the Government of India to expel a senior Canadian diplomat based in India. The concerned diplomat has been asked to leave India within the next five days. The decision reflects Government of India’s growing concern at the interference of Canadian diplomats in our internal matters and their involvement in anti-India activities.”
Here’s a chronology of how the Khalistani movement came to plague the relations between the world’s largest democracy and Canada, or the Great North – the second largest country in the world.
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Timeline of the Khalistani movement in Canada:
1971 – Dr Jagjit Singh Chauhan, a dentist and politician who left Punjab for London and declared himself the President of Khalistan. India was friends with Russia while the US wooed Pakistan (to cultivate it for ouster of Russia in Afghanistan) and China (remember Nixon?) while also siding with the latter on most geopolitical diatribes against India. Chauhan’s plan suited both American and Pakistani interests in punishing Indira Gandhi’s government for its tilt towards Moscow – sworn enemy of the US. Pakistan’s military dictator, General Yahya Khan backed Chauhan who then went to New York and on 12 October 1971. He ran an advertisement in The New York Times proclaiming the birth of Khalistan. ‘We are going to wait no more,’ the ad declared. ‘Today we are launching the final crusade …We are a nation in our own right.’
December 1971 – India defeated Pakistan, and East Pakistan was torn off to become an independent nation – Bangladesh. Worse yet, about 93,000 armed Pakistani soldiers surrendered to the Indian Army. Yahya Khan was kicked out and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who inherited the Khalistan project now used it as a portal for revenge upon India. In 2021, Canadian journalist Terri Milewski who wrote a book, titled Blood for Blood – Fifty Years of the Global Khalistan Project (published by HarperCollins India) in which he writes how Bhutto met a delegation of Sikhs in New York and said: “Sardarji, you have the keys to Nankana Sahib. Come there, we’ll help you and make it the capital of Khalistan. Start the movement from here.”
May 1974 – India conducted the Pokhran nuclear tests in Rajasthan and the Canadian Government led by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau was furious because the CANDU type reactors, provided by Canada for peaceful nuclear energy, had been repurposed for military use. Diplomatic ties between India and Canada withered. Several Sikhs sought Canadian citizenship alleging persecution in India for their pro-Khalistani activities.
1980s – Fomented by Pakistan that allowed safe passage to Khalistani separatists via Pakistani Punjab into Indian Punjab – numerous Khalistani terrorists (trained by Pakistani army and ISI) infiltrated into India. As the Khalistan movement in Punjab gained prominence, many Sikhs sought refugee status in Canada citing political persecution. Hindus inside Punjab were being targeted and mass executions by armed Sikh militia had begun. Intel sources learnt of rocket launchers being smuggled into basement of the Holy Harmandir Sahib Gurdwara or the Golden Temple. Among the many who migrated to Canada alleging persecution was Talwinder Singh Parmar, who made Canada his base for anti-India activities and is said to be the mastermind of the terrorist bombing of Air India flight 182, the Kanishka.
June 1984 – Operation Blue Star – the Indian Armed Forces operation between 1 and 10 June 1984 – carried out to remove Sikh militant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and other Sikh armed separatists from the buildings of the Golden Temple, the holiest site of Sikhism. Meanwhile, in Canada – the Khalistani separatists found it a convenient point to travel to Pakistan to meet and train with their handlers from Pakistan’s intelligence wing, ISI, as in the case of Parmar.
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31 October 1984: Then Prime Minister of India – Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her two Sikh bodyguards in New Delhi. Riots following the murder ended in the deaths of nearly 3000 Sikhs mostly in New Delhi.
June 23, 1985 – A bomb exploded on Air India Flight 182 en route from Toronto to London, England killing all 329 people aboard, most of them Canadians. To this day, the Air India bombing is still the worst terrorist attack in Canadian history. A bomb, sent via Vancouver, placed in cargo had exploded. Remnants of the plane were found off the Irish coast. There were no survivors – all 329 passenger plus crew onboard killed. It has been attributed mainly to the terrorist outfit Babbar Khalsa, while the Canadian Commission of Inquiry also mentioned the International Sikh Youth Federation. Needless to add, Talwinder Singh Parmar was the mastermind behind the mammoth tragedy.
1990s – The Khalistan movement died down in India but it survived in Canada, particularly in some gurdwaras controlled by radicals.
2010 – Prime Minister Manmohan Singh met his counterpart Stephen Harper on the margins of the G20 summit in Toronto, and expressed New Delhi’s frustration over Ottawa allowing the Khalistan issue to simmer.
2015 – Groups like Sikhs for Justice leveraged human rights laws and avowed freedom of expression to undertake lawfare against India. Khalistanis in Canada made a failed attempt to sabotage Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Canada.
Nov 2021 – India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) formally requested Canada to declare the organisation Sikhs for Justice a terrorist entity. NIA gave Canadian Law Enforcement agency in Ottawa the information and dossiers to back their case against the front. Canada did nothing.
June 2023 – The tableau of the assassination of late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi preceded another phase of the Khalistan Referendum in the Greater Toronto Area, before, the next in Vancouver in September. India raised objection, Canada did nothing. Meanwhile, Indian diplomats were being targeted by Khalistanis in Canada.
September 9-10 – PM Modi met Canadian PM Justin Trudeau on the sidelines of the G20 summit in New Delhi and asked him to rein in the anti-India activities going on under his watch on the Canadian soil. Trudeau said he told PM Modi that won’t tolerate India or any nation meddling in his country’s internal matters. Emboldened by Trudeau’s sanctuary, (and at the referendum event held at the Guru Nanak Singh Gurudwara in Surrey), Khalistani separatist and SFJ founder Gurpatwant Singh Pannun took the stage to deliver an incendiary speech hinting at the concept of ‘balkanising’ India.
September 18 – Canada asked an Indian diplomat to leave the country and its Prime Minister Justin Trudeau alleged that the Indian Government may have had links to the killing of Khalistani separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey in June. However, the outcome of the investigation into Nijjar’s suspicious death is awaited as it is now being led by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police or RCMP. But almost certainly, Trudeau’s statement on Monday has coloured the probe and ruined the already frosty ties between India and Canada. Trudeau, reportedly is doing this to woo his 5 lakh strong Sikh vote bank that may help his re-election bid in the Federal elections that are to be held in Canada in September 2025.
September 19 – MEA summoned the Canadian High Commissioner on Tuesday and expelled a senior diplomat of Canada in India in a retaliatory move.
