Modi’s threat to kill foreigners ‘in their homes’ has Canadian Sikh community on high alert
Muhammad Hamza and Paige Peacock,
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Brazen gangland-style attacks have targeted Sikhs across Canada. A Brampton man was warned by the RCMP that he was in danger. Communities in Winnipeg and BC’s Lower Mainland have been rocked by shootings. And a dual Canadian-U.S. citizen was marked for death in an assassination plot foiled just in time by American law enforcement.
His counterpart in British Columbia met a different fate, gunned down in broad daylight outside a Gurdwara in Surrey last year, after two hitmen fired dozens of shots into his bullet-riddled vehicle.
In a stunning revelation Monday, the RCMP released a statement warning Canadian Sikhs, particularly those advocating for religious and cultural autonomy in India, that the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has engaged in clandestine “criminal activity orchestrated by agents of the Government of India” that poses “consequential threats to the safety and security of Canadians and individuals living in Canada.”
The information put out by the Mounties has sent shockwaves from Ottawa to New Delhi, as Canada expelled six Indian diplomats including the highest ranking official over the Thanksgiving long weekend.
The bombshell news comes almost a year after the U.S. Justice Department filed a harrowing indictment filled with detailed evidence, including wire tap communications and other surveillance material, directly linking the Indian government to the assassination of Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey last year and a plot to kill Canadian-American citizen Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, the man who has led a global referendum movement to create an independent Sikh state, known as Khalistan, in the Punjab area of India where the religion’s followers make up the majority.
“Over the past few years, and more recently, law enforcement agencies in Canada, including the RCMP, have successfully investigated and charged a significant number of individuals for their direct involvement in homicides, extortions and other criminal acts of violence,” the RCMP stated Monday.
“In addition, there has been well over a dozen credible and imminent threats to life which have led to the conduct of Duty to Warn by law enforcement with members of the South Asian community, and specifically members of the pro-Khalistan movement.”
One of the men warned is Brampton resident and local Khalistan referendum organizer Inderjeet Singh Gosal who was contacted in August by the Ontario Provincial Police, under the RCMP’s duty to warn mandate, and told to be extra vigilant about any possible activity around him that could be part of the Indian government’s plot to harm North American Sikhs. Gosal was a “little shocked” by the news, even though advocates had known for years that their work could put them in danger.
Brampton has the biggest population of Sikhs outside India, with more than 163,000 residents who identified as followers of the faith in the 2021 Census, the largest religious group in the city (Christians were broken down by denomination with 113,000 Catholic followers).
On Monday Prime Minister Justin Trudeau responded to evidence provided by Canadian law enforcement and commented on his government’s decision to expel the Indian diplomats.
“We will never tolerate the involvement of a foreign government threatening and killing Canadian citizens on Canadian soil—a deeply unacceptable violation of Canada’s sovereignty and of international law.”
At two Brampton Gurdwaras, administrators and congregants who did not want their names published due to fears of being identified by the Indian government, said the community is well aware of the threat that has been created by Indian Prime Minister Modi and his Hindu-nationalist BJP government.
Sikh students at Humber College’s North Campus were similarly reluctant to identify themselves, citing “security fears”. The “climate of fear”, as one described it, that permeates the community makes members feel uncomfortable and afraid to voice their views in public.
Balpreet Singh, legal counsel and spokesperson of the World Sikh Organization, based in Canada with large support in Brampton, said the organization’s email platform has been attacked by agents of the Indian government several times, part of the threats the WSO has faced for years.
He spoke of the sweeping reality Sikhs in Brampton and other parts of the country have faced for years, and the heightened sense of concern since Modi was first elected Prime Minister in 2014, when his authoritarianism began to cut down India’s already fragile democratic institutions.
“I think that the Foreign Interference Commission has reported on it. The National Security Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians has reported on that, so that’s the evidence, as it were. I mean, our evidence is anecdotal. So I mean, even our organization, our social media, has been banned in India. And we received, for example, a notice from Google that our email and our email servers were attacked, and this was referred to as a foreign state attack, as one of the rarest alerts. So I mean… it’s not really a mystery which foreign state has attacked our email.”
As in the past, he expects India to respond to the latest Canadian government actions by stopping the electronic-visa program for Canadians of Indian background and/or suspending visa processing altogether. Singh calls these “childish tactics” and emphasizes that India needs to take responsibility for its campaign of transnational repression against Sikh activists, which is not limited to Canada but also includes the U.S., United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. “India must be held accountable for these acts.”
Ontario Gurdwara Committee secretary, Bhagat Singh Brar, expressed worry about the safety of those criticizing the Modi government, pointing out that people like incarcerated Indian gangster Lawrence Bishnoi are reportedly collaborating with the BJP government to commit murders and extortions in countries including Canada. Brar pointed out that Bishnoi threatens people using technology platforms with impunity and that Canadians have been targeted. India’s refusal to cooperate with ongoing investigations into these outrageous violations of national sovereignty undermines Canadian interests, he said. The ongoing Parliamentary probe into foreign interference of Canadian elections has included evidence of India’s activities and the ways local residents continue to be exploited for the BJP’s own political interests.
Brar is concerned about the lack of protection for Sikh leaders in Brampton and other parts of Canada.
“I think every person that speaks up against India has concerns about their safety right now. I mean, these guys are hiring people like Lawrence Bishnoi, who is a known gangster lodged in jail in India, and he is making video calls to people and asking, extorting them. How is this allowed? He is working with the Indian government. They are hiring him to carry out these extortions and killings,” Brar told The Pointer.
The RCMP investigation into India’s criminal activity in Canada has focussed on four critical concerns: the stoking of violent extremism impacting both countries; connections between Indian agents and homicides in Canada; the use of organized crime to intimidate the Sikh community and other South Asian communities in Canada; and interference in Canadian democratic processes.
Because of the mounting threats and India’s unwillingness to cooperate with Canadian officials in the ongoing investigations, the RCMP deemed it necessary to share its findings with the public to protect national security and Canadian citizens.
Modi’s BJP government and the Indian mainstream media controlled by it have adopted a predictable narrative of denial and deflected blame, claiming the Liberal government is simply trying to bolster political support among the influential Sikh community here, and claiming there is no evidence of state-sponsored criminal activity tied directly to the Indian government.
In fact, the evidence is alarming, detailed and available for anyone to review.
In the summer of 2023, as detailed in the evidence made public in the wide ranging indictment filed by the U.S. Justice Department, an unfolding plot reverberated through the global Sikh community. Described as a New York hit job, the alleged assassination plot to eliminate Pannun, a lawyer and prominent Canadian-American Sikh advocate, unveiled a larger conspiracy involving multiple targets, with severe international implications.
The evidence revealed in the U.S. criminal indictment detailed a plot to covertly organize killings on Canadian soil and in the U.S.; including the one in New York involving Mr. Pannun which is the primary focus of the indictment.
The architect of the alleged murder attempts is allegedly an Indian government official, described as a “Senior Field Officer” with different responsibilities in intelligence and security management, having also previously served in India’s Central Reserve Police Force, trained as an officer in “battle craft” and “weapons.”
Mr. Pannun is identified by American officials as the target in New York (referred to in the indictment as “the Victim”), a lawyer and leader of a New York-based group called Sikhs for Justice — an American and Canadian citizen and a proponent of an independent Sikh state in the northern Indian state of Punjab, where the vast majority of the world’s 26 million Sikhs live.
The carefully reported U.S. criminal filing paints a chilling portrait of the Modi government and the sloppy, violent mob-like actions taken to protect its Hindu-nationalist policies.
The U.S. criminal indictment unsealed in November includes evidence that the unnamed government employee offered $100,000 for a contract hit on the Sikh separatist lawyer in New York and recruited Nikhil Gupta, an Indian national who also resides in India, to arrange it.
Behind the scenes, through a series of phone and other electronic communications, along with an in-person rendezvous in New Delhi, a contract to kill was being arranged against Pannun, according to the U.S. evidence. In exchange for his agreement to orchestrate the murder, the bargaining chip was the government employee’s assistance in securing the dismissal of an Indian criminal case against Gupta — described in the indictment as an associate of the government employee, with involvement in international narcotics and weapons trafficking.
In the early days of May 2023, the alleged Indian government employee, referred to in the indictment as “CC-1”, informed Gupta that there was a “target in New York” and another target in “California.”
”We will hit our all Targets,” Gupta responded, according to the evidence.
On May 12, the government employee notified Gupta his criminal case had “already been taken care of,” in exchange for his orchestration of the murder, and that “nobody from Gujrat… police is calling” referring to Indian officials involved in Gupta’s criminal case. On May 23, CC-1 again assured Gupta they had “spoke[n] with the boss about your Gujarat [case],” that it was “all clear,” and “nobody will ever bother you again.”
With these assurances, Gupta moved to arrange the murder.
Nearly a week later, on May 29, Gupta asked a confidential source working with U.S. law enforcement — who he believed to be a criminal associate — by phone if the person knew anyone who would be willing to carry out a murder-for-hire in the United States. He explained that the intended victim (Pannun) was a lawyer who split time between New York and another U.S. city.
Over the ensuing weeks, through a series of electronic and recorded communications, including by phone, video, and text message, with the confidential source and later the hitman, “who was in fact an undercover U.S. law enforcement officer,” hired to carry out the plot, they discussed the logistics and price of the murder.
“We are ready to pay $150,000… the offer will go higher depending upon the quality of the work…and if it’s done as soon as possible,” the government employee said when discussing the payment for killing Pannun. Gupta replied to CC-1 with a screenshot of the confidential source requesting $100,000, to which the alleged government employee agreed, adding that while an advance payment was not possible, “the whole money will be paid with in [sic] 24 hours after the work is done.”
After forwarding Pannun’s home address in New York, on June 3, 2023, Gupta urged the source to have his associates carry out the murder soon, stating: “finish him brother, finish him, don’t take too much time … push these guys, push these guys … finish the job.”
According to the allegations in the indictment, as the Indian government employee and Gupta sought to expedite the assassination, the pair offered to make an upfront cash payment for the murder and arranged the payment of $15,000 in cash to the hired hitman — the undercover officer working for the American government — in Manhattan, as an advance payment for the murder of Pannun. The indictment included a photo of a roll of hundred-dollar bills that prosecutors said was an advance payment for the New York job.
While the murder-for-hire plot was unfolding, the assassination of Nijjar — an associate of Pannun — was about to take place on the other side of the continent outside the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara, a temple in Surrey, British Columbia.
In the hours following the June 18th killing, the alleged Indian government employee sent Gupta a video clip showing Nijjar’s bloody body slumped in his vehicle. The clip was forwarded minutes later to the confidential source and the undercover American government agent.
On June 19, the day after the Nijjar murder, Gupta told the person he believed to be the hired killer, or the “hitman,” that Nijjar “was also the target” of the assassinations but that he was “#4, #3” on the list, adding “not to worry…we have so many targets.” He confirmed to the confidential source that Nijjar was the target Gupta had previously mentioned as the potential Canadian “job” and the “big target” in Canada. He added that, in light of Nijjar’s murder, there was “no need to wait” on assassinating Pannun. A day later, the alleged Indian government employee sent Gupta a news article about the New York target.
“[I]t’s [a] priority now,” he wrote.
In a shift from his previous instruction to delay the assassination of Pannun until after political engagements between high-level U.S. and Indian government officials, Gupta told the confidential source the hired killer should assassinate Pannun “as soon as possible,” informing the source that “we got the go-ahead to go anytime, even today, tomorrow.” He also told the source to expect Pannun to be more careful in the wake of the Nijjar murder.
He directed the source to “find the opportunity” to assassinate Pannun and to “do it quickly”, adding that four jobs needed to be finished by June 29, which included Pannun and three targets in Canada.
“He will be more cautious, because in Canada, his colleague is down. His colleague is down. I sent you the video. So he will be more cautious, so we should not give them the chance, any chance,” Gupta said, according to evidence in the indictment. He added: “If he is not alone, [if] there are two guys with him in the meeting or something … put everyone down, put everyone down.”
But Gupta never got the chance to finish another job.
He was arrested on June 30 at the request of U.S. authorities by Czech law enforcement authorities in connection with his participation in the plot to assassinate Pannun after travelling from India to the Czech Republic. He was charged with murder-for-hire and conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire, both of which carry a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The American Justice department described Nijjar’s assassination and the attempt on Pannun’s life as the work of an “Indian Government Employee” who “Directed a Plot from India to Murder [a] U.S.-Based Leader of Sikh Separatist Movement.”
Earlier this year, after Trudeau first rose in Parliament in 2023 and made the bombshell allegation of Indian criminal activity on Canadian soil and after the damning U.S. indictment, Modi used the overwhelming evidence against his government, when the BJP was campaigning in India’s federal election.
Stoking Hindu-nationalist resentment toward religious minorities he boasted in strongman fashion about his willingness to protect Hindu nationalism even on foreign soil. “This new India comes into your home to kill you,” Modi said at a rally on April 5 in reference to foreigners who supposedly work to undermine Indian sovereignty from abroad.
He repeated similar rhetoric during the spring campaign, prompting outrage around the world, including among moderates in India who called for internal investigations into Modi’s incitement and support of crimes, even on foreign soil. No action was taken, and now Modi and his state controlled media are claiming no evidence exists to support allegations of Indian criminal activity on foreign soil.
In an interview with The Pointer from New York, Pannun criticized the narrative of India as a developing international power. This conceals widespread poverty and horrific human rights violations against religious minorities, women and hundreds of millions of lower caste Indians including Hindus who are exploited by Modi’s authoritarian agenda. He cautions the U.S. and Canada against putting economic interests ahead of the rule of law and protection of democratic foundations.
Despite decades of campaigning, Pannun says that only now, in the wake of the extrajudicial executions of activists like Hardeep Singh Nijjar, are Western nations seeing the Indian government’s abhorrent activities as an extension of decades of anti-democratic crack downs and state-sponsored violence against its own people.
“We exposed that 1984 wasn’t anti-Sikh riots. We exposed that that was a Sikh genocide orchestrated by Hindu nationalist death squads,” he said, referring to the widespread massacres across much of the country following the assassination of prime minister Indira Gandhi by her two Sikh bodyguards as reprisal for her military attack on the Golden Temple, the holy base of the faith.
“We exposed how Modi massacred the Muslims in Gujarat. We exposed how the Christians are being targeted in Manipur; over 700 churches have been burned in the last eight months. Nuns have been raped. But this is not being reported because, through their media outlets, through their economic power, which we are giving them, (they are doing these things with impunity).
“Today, Canada had to take a hard stance after they failed to convince the Modi government that you are committing violence and you are challenging Canada’s sovereignty,” he said. “You are killing Canadians on Canadian soil while this is unacceptable, but knowing Modi and knowing successive Indian regimes, they have become arrogant because they were not held accountable. Had they been held accountable (in the ‘80s and ‘90s) for committing genocide of Sikhs and extrajudicial killings (we would not see this today). Each and every report speaks volumes that the Sikh community is facing persecution in Indian-occupied Punjab based on their political opinion and based on their religion.”
Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have taken the marginalization of minority groups to new depths. Amit Shah, Modi’s right-hand man and India’s powerful Home Minister, has called Muslims in the country “termites” and “cockroaches”. According to reporting by the Washington Post, Shah is the leader who ordered the assassination of Mr. Nijjar and other criminal acts in Canada.
Pannun addressed Canada’s expulsion of Indian High Commissioner Sanjay Verma and other Indian diplomats over the weekend. The killing of Mr. Nijjar, who worked directly with Pannun on the Sikh referendum movement, was made possible by the logistical assistance these diplomats offered, he said. He also criticized Canadian MP Chandra Arya for mischaracterizing the ongoing struggle for Sikh rights in an increasingly hostile, Hindu-nationalist India, putting the Sikh population in Canada at risk by suggesting those who support the Khalistan movement for autonomous rights—which were supposed to have been enshrined in the Indian constitution but remain absent from the founding document—are somehow sponsoring anti-Hindu views.
Pannun said Indian consulates in Vancouver and Toronto are used by the Indian government to connect with networks involved with covert activities. He cautions that until these networks are exposed, Canada’s sovereignty and its elections will continue to be threatened by interference from India, whose BJP government sees the autonomy and freedom of Canadian Sikhs as a threat to its Hindu-nationalist agenda.
Pannun says more than 200 Sikh activists are facing charges of terrorism and sedition across India, and the government has for a few years turned its attention overseas, focussing on advocates in the U.S., UK, Australia and Canada. He says Modi misunderstands Western democracies, assuming he can appeal to right-leaning views that are becoming more popular, but Pannun pointed out that former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper’s position on the issue was one of the strongest, when he vigorously defended Canadian Sikh activists, telling the Indian government at the time that no Canadian leader can compromise the right of peaceful support for what the Khalistan movement represents.
The Canadian, British and American governments have all made clear that Modi’s false claims of dangerous Sikh activities in their countries are simply not true, but that does not stop Modi, his BJP government and his state-controlled mainstream media from constantly making the claim.
The Indian government has even condemned Prime Minister Trudeau for attending Sikh Vaisakhi Day celebrations when followers mark the day that was instrumental in the founding of the faith.
As for his own personal concerns, given the government of the largest country in the world seems determined to kill him, Pannun says he is not phased.
“Safety is in the hands of Guru. Nobody can dictate the day and the time of your death that is written by Guru the day you were born. You have to live your life with a mission and with a cause. And our cause is that we are going to go and liberate Punjab from Indian occupation and create a Sikh homeland where all religions will have an equal place and they will be equally recognized.”
Muhammad Hamza and Paige Peacock,
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
The Pointer
