New Delhi:

Indian students in Canada “should be aware of their surrounding” and resist radicalisation attempts by Khalistani terrorists and extremists, Sanjay Kumar Verma, India’s recalled High Commissioner told NDTV Thursday evening. Mr Verma urged the parents of students in Canada to “please talk to them regularly and try to understand” their situation, and to guide them away from unwise choices.

“At this time in Canada there is a threat from Khalistani terrorists and extremists to the larger Indian community… including students (of whom there were around 319,000 as of 2023),” he said.

“How this (Khalistani terrorists’ outreach to Indian students in Canada) works is… given the condition of that economy there are few jobs… so students are offered money and food, and this is how Khalistani terrorists and extremists influence them with nefarious plans” Mr Verma explained to NDTV.

Some students, he said, are also persuaded to take photographs or videos of themselves ‘protesting’ – shouting anti-India slogans or insulting the flag – outside Indian diplomatic buildings in Canada.

“Then they are told to go seek asylum… because their version will be, ‘If I go back to India now, I will be punished…’ and there have been cases of such students being given asylum,” he said.

There are, therefore, various kinds of negative influences acting on Indian students in Canada that are pushing them towards the wrong direction, Mr Verma told NDTV, as he appealed to parents.

Mr Verma’s comments come as the India-Canada diplomatic relationship spirals downward over repeated and unsubstantiated claims by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau – that “agents” of Delhi conspire with criminal gangs, including the Lawrence Bishnoi outfit, to “target (the) South Asians” in that country.

READ | “Bishnoi Gang Linked To Indian Govt Agents”: Canada Cops’ Claim

The row broke in September last year after Mr Trudeau claimed “credible allegations” the Indian government was involved in the killing of Khalistani leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian citizen.

Nijjar, branded a terrorist by the Indian government, was shot dead in Vancouver in June 2023.

India has emphatically junked links to his death, rubbishing them as “absurd” and “malicious” and pointing out, repeatedly, that neither Mr Trudeau nor his government have shared any hard evidence.

READ | “Preposterous Imputations”: Trudeau’s Escalation, India’s Strong Rebuttal

Last week India pointed to Mr Trudeau’s confession – before an inquiry commission in Ottawa – that he had no “hard evidentiary proof” when linking the Indian government to the Nijjar murder.

READ | “As We Said, No Evidence Whatsoever”: India On Trudeau’s Deposition

Mr Verma underlined that point to NDTV today, saying “not a shred of evidence” had been shared with him since his appointment as High Commissioner in Canada in September 2022. In fact, Mr Verma said it was India that had shared evidence of extremist groups in Canada, but “no action was taken…”

READ | “We Told Canada About Bishnoi-Brar Links”: Recalled Envoy To NDTV

The crisis that began last year exploded further this month after Canadian federal police linked the Bishnoi gang and identified Mr Verma – India’s senior-most serving diplomat – as a ‘person of interest’ in cases of “homicide, extortion, intimidation, and coercion”. Canada declared it would expel Mr Verma.

READ | Nijjar Killing, Bishnoi Gang, Trade Talks: How India-Canada Ties Soured

New Delhi, furious at Canada’s treatment of Mr Verma, instead recalled him and five of his staff, and retaliated by ejecting Canada’s acting High Commissioner, Stewart Wheeler, and his staff members.

Mr Verma was also made ‘persona non grata‘ – a diplomatic term meaning a ‘person who is no longer welcome’. He becomes the first Indian diplomat to have ever been treated as such.

NDTV is now available on WhatsApp channels. Click on the link to get all the latest updates from NDTV on your chat.

New Delhi:

Indian students in Canada “should be aware of their surrounding” and resist radicalisation attempts by Khalistani terrorists and extremists, Sanjay Kumar Verma, India’s recalled High Commissioner told NDTV Thursday evening. Mr Verma urged the parents of students in Canada to “please talk to them regularly and try to understand” their situation, and to guide them away from unwise choices.

“At this time in Canada there is a threat from Khalistani terrorists and extremists to the larger Indian community… including students (of whom there were around 319,000 as of 2023),” he said.

“How this (Khalistani terrorists’ outreach to Indian students in Canada) works is… given the condition of that economy there are few jobs… so students are offered money and food, and this is how Khalistani terrorists and extremists influence them with nefarious plans” Mr Verma explained to NDTV.

Some students, he said, are also persuaded to take photographs or videos of themselves ‘protesting’ – shouting anti-India slogans or insulting the flag – outside Indian diplomatic buildings in Canada.

“Then they are told to go seek asylum… because their version will be, ‘If I go back to India now, I will be punished…’ and there have been cases of such students being given asylum,” he said.

There are, therefore, various kinds of negative influences acting on Indian students in Canada that are pushing them towards the wrong direction, Mr Verma told NDTV, as he appealed to parents.

Mr Verma’s comments come as the India-Canada diplomatic relationship spirals downward over repeated and unsubstantiated claims by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau – that “agents” of Delhi conspire with criminal gangs, including the Lawrence Bishnoi outfit, to “target (the) South Asians” in that country.

READ | “Bishnoi Gang Linked To Indian Govt Agents”: Canada Cops’ Claim

The row broke in September last year after Mr Trudeau claimed “credible allegations” the Indian government was involved in the killing of Khalistani leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian citizen.

Nijjar, branded a terrorist by the Indian government, was shot dead in Vancouver in June 2023.

India has emphatically junked links to his death, rubbishing them as “absurd” and “malicious” and pointing out, repeatedly, that neither Mr Trudeau nor his government have shared any hard evidence.

READ | “Preposterous Imputations”: Trudeau’s Escalation, India’s Strong Rebuttal

Last week India pointed to Mr Trudeau’s confession – before an inquiry commission in Ottawa – that he had no “hard evidentiary proof” when linking the Indian government to the Nijjar murder.

READ | “As We Said, No Evidence Whatsoever”: India On Trudeau’s Deposition

Mr Verma underlined that point to NDTV today, saying “not a shred of evidence” had been shared with him since his appointment as High Commissioner in Canada in September 2022. In fact, Mr Verma said it was India that had shared evidence of extremist groups in Canada, but “no action was taken…”

READ | “We Told Canada About Bishnoi-Brar Links”: Recalled Envoy To NDTV

The crisis that began last year exploded further this month after Canadian federal police linked the Bishnoi gang and identified Mr Verma – India’s senior-most serving diplomat – as a ‘person of interest’ in cases of “homicide, extortion, intimidation, and coercion”. Canada declared it would expel Mr Verma.

READ | Nijjar Killing, Bishnoi Gang, Trade Talks: How India-Canada Ties Soured

New Delhi, furious at Canada’s treatment of Mr Verma, instead recalled him and five of his staff, and retaliated by ejecting Canada’s acting High Commissioner, Stewart Wheeler, and his staff members.

Mr Verma was also made ‘persona non grata‘ – a diplomatic term meaning a ‘person who is no longer welcome’. He becomes the first Indian diplomat to have ever been treated as such.

NDTV is now available on WhatsApp channels. Click on the link to get all the latest updates from NDTV on your chat.

Ottawa, Canada:

It is not uncommon to see a country’s election campaigns politicise various global issues, but what is rather unusual and perhaps unique in the case of Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, is “how far he can go” for personal electoral gains. His attempts have reached a level where actual diplomatic relations are seeing a fallout over “the politics of vote-bank”.

India and Canada are in the midst of the worst-ever diplomatic spat in the history of bilateral ties between the two nations. India has recalled its high commissioner to Canada and expelled six top diplomats from Canada yesterday. Canada mirrored India’s move. The reason – Justin Trudeau’s proximity to the Khalistan separatist movement and his sympathy towards declared terrorists and extremists who spread hate, violence, and extremism on Canadian soil – all to appeal to his vote bank.

Mr Trudeau, who is seeking another term as Canada’s prime minister, but facing one setback after another politically in his country, has repeatedly supported the Khalistani separatist movement and allowed space for them to operate by calling it “freedom of speech” in his country.

The Prime Minister of Canada has stood shoulder-to-shoulder with terrorists, extremists and separatists by attending Khalistan rallies in Canada. By doing so, Canada’s Prime Minister has directly violated India’s national security concerns whilst also violating India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity by supporting those who want another nation to be carved out of India – terming all this as “free speech in Canada.”

“Celebration and glorification of violence should not be a part of any civilized society. Democratic countries which respect the rule of law should not allow intimidation by radical elements in the name of freedom of expression,” India had said about Trudeau’s attendance at the Khalistan rally.

Citing his concern over grave situation and rapidly deteriorating ties, while also seeing a rise in extremist elements in Canada, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar had said earlier this year that “By allowing political space to Khalistani separatist elements, the Canadian government (led by Justin Trudeau) is repeatedly showing that its vote bank is more powerful than its rule of law.”

Speaking to Press Trust of India, Mr Jaishankar had said, “India respects and practices freedom of speech, but that does not equate with freedom to threaten foreign diplomats, extend support to separatism or allow political space to elements advocating violence and terror.”

Mr Jaishankar had also wondered how people with “dubious backgrounds are being allowed to enter and live in Canada”, referring to select Khalistani separatists among the Sikh migrants from Punjab.

“In any rules-based society, you would imagine that you would check people’s background, how they came, what passport they carried etc,” he said, adding that “If you have people whose presence there is itself on very dubious documents, what does it say about you? It actually says that your vote bank is more powerful than your rule of law.”

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TRUDEAU’S LATEST ATTEMPT

India and Canada have been dealing with an unprecedented diplomatic crisis after Justin Trudeau alleged that Indian government agents were involved in the killing of Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Canada. India has rejected Canada’s allegations, terming it “absurd” and “politically motivated.”

Losing electoral ground fast in the last few months since key ally, Jagmeet Singh withdrew support to his party, Justin Trudeau has likely pacified his “vote bank” late on Monday as he doubled down on accusations of India “supporting criminal activity against Canadians” and “coercive behaviour targeting South Asian Canadians”.

In his latest allegations, Mr Trudeau called the Indian High Commissioner a “person of interest” in the “murder” investigation of Khalistani terrorist Nijjar. India trashed Mr Trudeau’s allegations, describing them as “preposterous imputations.”

On its part, India – which has yet to respond to these latest comments – has set up a high-level committee to investigate the allegation.

However, calling out “the political agenda of Justin Trudeau’s government” in a strongly worded rebuttal, India issued a statement saying, “The Government of India strongly rejects these preposterous imputations and ascribes them to the political agenda of the Trudeau Government that is centered around vote bank politics.”

“Since Prime Minister Trudeau made certain allegations in September 2023, the Canadian government has not shared a shred of evidence with the Government of India, despite many requests from our side. This latest step follows interactions that have again witnessed assertions without any facts. This leaves little doubt that on the pretext of an investigation, there is a deliberate strategy of smearing India for political gains,” India’s statement read.

“Prime Minister Trudeau’s hostility to India has long been in evidence. In 2018, his visit to India, which was aimed at currying favour with a vote bank, rebounded to his discomfort. His Cabinet has included individuals who have openly associated with an extremist and separatist agenda regarding India. His naked interference in Indian internal politics in December 2020 showed how far he was willing to go in this regard. That his government was dependent on a political party, whose leader openly espouses a separatist ideology vis-a-vis India, only aggravated matters,” Centre’s statement further read.

TRUDEAU’S POLITICAL SETBACKS AHEAD OF CANADA ELECTIONS

In the last few months, Justin Trudeau has faced a series of political setbacks. What has been alarming for him is that he has lost the support of his key ally, Jagmeet Singh’s party. Singh openly professes for ‘Khalistan’.

Doubts about the leadership of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau intensified after his ruling Liberal Party suffered two humiliating losses in a special election, but despite that, the unpopular leader is determined to cling to office ahead of a looming national vote.

The loss, following a defeat in Toronto in late June, reinforced the perception that Liberal prospects in the next national election are dim. The mandate for Trudeau’s minority government expires at the end of October 2025, but an early election has become increasingly likely.

Although polls indicate the Liberals will lose badly to the official opposition right-of-center Conservatives in the next election amid unhappiness over inflation, healthcare and a housing crisis, Trudeau and his closest aides say he is going nowhere and has time to help the party recover.

According to a survey by global market research and public opinion firm IPSOS, only 26 per cent people see Justin Trudeau as a good PM – he found himself to be 19 per cent less than Pierre Poilievre, leader of the Conservative Party.

Facing being ousted from the post of Prime Minister, Mr Trudeau has made a series of allegations against India to polarise the electorate whilst catering to his vote bank in a desperate attempt to get all the support he can for him to remain prime minister.

THE INDIAN DIASPORA

The Indian diaspora in Canada is about 1.8 million strong and there are another one million Non Resident Indians residing in the country. The Indian diaspora, mostly of Sikh ethnicity, is considered an influential bloc in Canada’s politics.

Ties between India and Canada came under severe strain following Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s allegations in September last year of the “potential” involvement of Indian agents in the killing of Nijjar.