Canada removes 41 of its diplomats from India: What happens next?

Canada has pulled out 41 diplomats from India amid a chill in relations over the killing of Khalistani leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar. The development comes weeks after New Delhi asked Ottawa to curtail its diplomatic presence in the country following Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau’s allegations linking India to the June murder of Nijjar in British Columbia.

India has dismissed the accusation as “absurd” and “motivated”. How will Canada reducing its diplomatic staff affect India? Let’s understand.

41 Canadian diplomats leave India

On Thursday (19 October), Canada’s foreign minister, Melanie Joly, told reporters that 41 Canadian diplomats and their 42 dependents have left India.

Currently, only 21 diplomats are in India. She said that India had said that immunity for “all but 21 diplomats” would be “unilaterally removed” by 20 October, reported BBC.

“Given the implications of India’s actions on the safety of our diplomats, we have facilitated their safe departure from India,” Joly told reporters.

The Canadian foreign minister said Ottawa would not take retaliatory steps.

Correction | Amid India-Canada diplomatic tensions, Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly says "As of now, I can confirm that India has formally conveyed its plan to unilaterally* (not unethically as reported earlier) remove diplomatic immunities for all but 21 Canadian…

— ANI (@ANI) October 20, 2023

“If we allow the norm of diplomatic immunity to be broken, no diplomats anywhere on the planet would be safe. So for this reason, we will not reciprocate,” she was quoted as saying by Reuters.

In early October, Trudeau had said that Canada needs diplomats in India to help steer the “extremely challenging” rift between the two nations. Acknowledging the heightened tensions, he had said, “That’s why it’s so important for us to have diplomats on the ground, working with the Indian government, there to support Canadians and Canadian families,” reported The Canadian Press. 

What could be the impact?

Joly said Canada will have to reduce its services in India due to a shortage of diplomatic staff. There will be a pause on in-person visa and consular services in Chandigarh, Mumbai and Bengaluru, as per Indian Express. However, services will remain available at the High Commission of Canada in Delhi, BBC reported citing officials.

Consular assistance will also be provided through email or phone.

Canada’s immigration minister Marc Miller said the move meant Ottawa would lessen the number of embassy staff handling immigration.

“We acknowledge the concerns and frustrations that this situation may cause for clients, families, educational institutions, communities, businesses in Canada as a whole,” Reuters quoted him as saying.

Indians made up the largest percentage of permanent residents and temporary foreign workers in Canada last year. India is also the largest source of Canada’s international students , comprising about 40 per cent of study permit holders currently.

Miller said that the cutting down of staff would result in slower immigration processing for Indians seeking to enter Canada . According to The Globe and Mail, the withdrawal of staff could lead to a backlog of 17,500 decisions on applications from India.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) said in a statement it is slashing its staff from 27 to just 5 in India.

“Clients might see that their applications are taking longer to process, questions may take longer to answer, and visas may take longer to be put in passports,” as per CIC News.

Miller said that visa application centres (VACs) in India are unlikely to be affected as they are operated by third-party contractors, reported Reuters.

The IRCC statement noted that Indians could expect delays in “overall processing times, responses to their enquiries and getting their visas or passports returned”.

However, Immigration lawyer Richard Kurland told Vancouver Sun that Canada has an online system that enables its officials in other countries to take charge of the processing operations.

“The large majority of applications from India are already processed outside the country, with 89 per cent of India’s applications processed through the global network. The five Canada-based IRCC staff who remain in India will focus on work that requires an in-country presence such as urgent processing, visa printing, risk assessment and overseeing key partners,” IRCC said in its statement.

Meanwhile, under the section ‘regional risks’, Canada has asked its nations in India to “exercise a high degree of caution in and around Bengaluru, Chandigarh and Mumbai.” It also said that in-person consular services are “temporarily unavailable” in these cities.

With inputs from agencies