The downward spiral of Canada-India bilateral ties

New Delhi earlier this year alleged that the Trudeau Government was going soft on Khalistani extremists in Canada due to vote bank politics. Nearly 500,000 Sikhs account for about 1.4% of the total population of Canada.

Though the anti-India campaign by Khalistani Sikh extremists in Canada has long been an irritant, the bilateral relations between New Delhi and Ottawa have been on a downward spiral over the past few years after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had in November 2020 commented on the agitation by the farmers against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government.

Cameron MacKay, Ottawa’s envoy to New Delhi, was summoned to the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) of the Government of India early on Tuesday. The senior MEA officials conveyed to him New Delhi’s rejection of the allegations made by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau about India’s role in the killing of a Khalistani Sikh extremist in his country.

This was however not the first time a High Commissioner of Canada to New Delhi was summoned to the MEA.

MacKay’s predecessor, Nadir Patel, had also been called in to the MEA headquarters at the South Block in New Delhi in December 2020. Canadian Prime Minister’s comments expressing concerns over agitation by the farmers in India against the three agricultural laws introduced by the Modi Government had then irked New Delhi. Not only Trudeau, but Sikh ministers in the Canadian Government had also tweeted comments on police action against the agitating farmers in India. They all had expressed concern and stressed the importance of allowing protests in democracies. Patel had been served a démarche, conveying that the comments made by Trudeau and other ministers of the Canadian Government on the protest by farmers “constitute an unacceptable interference in internal affairs” of India. Trudeau had ignored protests from New Delhi and reiterated that Canada would always stand up for the right of peaceful protest and human rights anywhere around the world

MacKay, who took over as Canada’s envoy to India in March 2022, was summoned to the MEA at least twice earlier this year. He was first summoned after a group of protestors – mostly Canadian Sikhs – staged a demonstration in front of the Consulate General of India in Vancouver in March this year, protesting against the crackdown on radical preacher Amritpal Singh and his associates in Punjab in India. They waved the flags of Khalistan and raised slogans demanding its secession from India. A similar protest was staged in front of the High Commission of India in Ottawa.

New Delhi conveyed to Ottawa its expectation that the Government of Canada would take all steps required to ensure the safety of the diplomats and security of the diplomatic premises of India so that they could fulfil their normal diplomatic functions.

MacKay was summoned to the MEA again in July after the Khalistani Sikhs in Canada circulated flyers with pictures of India’s diplomats in Canada being marked as the “killers” responsible for the murder of extremist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in the North American country.

New Delhi earlier this year alleged that the Trudeau Government was going soft on Khalistani extremists in Canada due to vote bank politics.

Nearly 500,000 Sikhs account for about 1.4 per cent of the total population of Canada.

Trudeau’s visit to New Delhi in February 2018 had been overshadowed by the perception that Ottawa had done very little to address New Delhi's concerns over continued anti-India activities by radical pro-Khalistani elements among the Sikhs in Canada. The invitation to Jaspal Atwal, a convicted assassin and a former activist of the now-outlawed International Sikh Youth Federation, to a reception hosted by Ottawa's envoy to New Delhi during the visit of the Canadian Prime Minister had irked India.

Notwithstanding the crackdown on Sikh militants in Canada after the 1985 bombing of Air India’s Kanishka aircraft, pro-Khalistani elements and groups remained active in the North American country.