Why Canada should shed its Khalistan delusion

“Khalistan state has already been proclaimed. They have announced the Government. I will show you the currency of Khalistan Government. This is a dollar currency. It is from Canada. This has been posted from Canada to Comrade Harkishan Singh Surjeet, who is our MP. The stamp is a Canadian stamp. Here is their letterhead – Republic of Khalistan, Office of the Consul General, Johnston Building, Suite I-45, Kingsway, Vancouver, B.C. Canada-V5T3H7, Phone:872-321”.

Late Samar Mukherjee (1913-2013), the CPM leader representing Howrah LS Constituency almost dropped a bombshell in Lok Sabha on 1 December, 1981 while participating in a discussion on the separatist campaigns against the integrity of India. The veteran communist termed Canadian connection to Khalistan as an “imperialistic” agenda against India. Like a bad infection, the Canadian connection to Khalistan project refuses to go even after four decades. One wonders if this much time was not enough for Canada to find out about the vacuity and irrationality of the Khalistan project, which has little to survive upon except anti-India hate and passion. At the peak of Khalistani insurgency, the then Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Dr Allan J MacEachen had visited India in July 1983. He had assured that his government would not allow any person from India to seek political asylum in Canada. He informed that they had closed down the so-called Khalistan Consulate in Canada, and denied visa to Jagjit Singh Chauhan, the UK based Khalistani leader. Two years later the bombing of Air India Flight 182 (“Emperor Kanishka”) on 23 June, 1985 killing 329 persons, of whom 268 were Canadian citizens, exposed the intactness of Khalistani terror base in Canada. It is a pity that Canada has apparently learnt nothing and forgotten everything. There is a renewed war of words between Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the External Affairs Ministry of India over the Hardeep Singh Nijjar assassination case. Nijjar’s killing is blamed on India, which has denied the charges as false. It is a dangerous brinkmanship for the Canadian prime minister to risk ties with world’s largest democracy and fifth largest economy in pursuit of an unsolved murder of a person who had entered Canada with a false identity 25 years ago. On 22 March, 1990 Gerald Vincent Bull, the Canadian engineer and inventor of “Supergun”, a long-range piece of artillery, was assassinated in upscale Brussels suburb. His assassination is generally attributed to Mossad operatives, who wanted to prevent Bull from installing supergun in Iraq, at the behest of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, who vowed to destroy Israel. Since Bull had not responded to wise counsel of backing off from the “Babylon gun” project, his elimination became inevitable. The killing of this thoroughbred Canadian engineer never became a serious issue between Canada and Israel. Nijjar, on the other hand, fled India in February 1997 on a fake passport “Ravi Sharma” to enter Canada. His name also figured in the most-wanted list handed over by the then Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh to Trudeau in February 2018 when the latter visited Punjab. It is a pity that Canada should be risking its relationship with India for such an individual.

II

Way back on 26 November, 1985 two senior Indian diplomats posted in Indian High Commission in Pakistan viz. Counsellor B Jain and First Secretary KK Khanna, were grievously attacked by a group of Canadian Sikhs within Dehra Sahib Gurudwara complex in Lahore. The diplomat duo had gone there from Islamabad to help in the transportation of the body of an Indian pilgrim who had died the previous day due to cardiac arrest while inside the Gurudwara complex. As a result of the assault, the two diplomats received head injuries, and had to be admitted to a Lahore hospital. Later, they were discharged, being declared out of danger. This was stated in the Lok Sabha by the MoS, External Affairs viz. KR Narayanan on 29 November, 1985. The Indian High Commission had a tough time in getting the assailants arrested. For the first 48 hours after the incident was reported, nothing was done. The assailants moved around freely between Lahore and Nankana Sahib. However, even when six Canadian Sikhs were arrested, they were immediately released on bail furnished by a Pakistani citizen who was the main instigator behind the attack on diplomats. Even after they were re-arrested following dogged pursuit of the matter from the Indian side, they were charged with minor offences. No action was taken by the Pakistani authority for the provocative speeches delivered by those Canadian Sikhs. This was revealed by Minister of External Affairs viz. BR Bhagat in Lok Sabha on 2 December, 1985 after Kamal Nath called the attention of the minister on the issue. In the current debate over India-Canada diplomatic standoff surrounding the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, the name of Talwinder Singh Parmar, a naturalised Canadian citizen, has often resurfaced in the media Parmar was a key suspect in bombing of Air India Flight 182. Parmar was later gunned down in an encounter with security forces in Phillaur village of Jalandhar district in Punjab on 15 October, 1992. Parmar, at the time of his killed, was accompanied by two Pakistani extremists named Intekhab Ahmed Zia and Habibullah who fought alongside him (vide Close Encounter by Rajeev Sharma, Sunday, 6-14 November, 1992, P.27). As per this Sunday report, both Zia and Habibullah had entered India on 21 May, 1992 on business visas. Their real objective was to a) bring Punjab and Kashmir militants on a common platform b) form a political party in Punjab to further weaken the Akalis. The report further identified three more Khalistani terrorists who were in touch with Pakistan. They included Wadhwa Singh, the then chief of Babbar Khalsa. Manjit Singh, a prime suspect in bombing of Air India’s Flight 182 and Daljit Singh Bitto, and master strategist and ideologue. One does not think that any Canadian prime minister lost his yawn (let his sleep) over these incidents involving Canadian Sikhs. Salim Jiwa in his book The Death of Air India Flight 182 (1986), devotes few passages to the career of Talwinder Singh Parmar alias Harpav Singh Parmar while he was still alive. “Parmar, who calls himself a Jathedar, a commander who fights injustice” – informs Jiwa- “lives in a plush house, and owns three cars. Authorities believe that he is financed by his followers and a rich Vancouver area businessman” (P.200) Jiwa’s book describes the inception of the Khalistani movement in Canada in the early 1980s. It was actually Surjan Singh Gill, who had opened a poorly furnished office in Kingsway, Vancouver. Gill called himself the ambassador of the Republic of Khalistan. Behind his chair on the wall hung the banner of Khalistan. Gill was an acolyte of Dr Jagjit Singh Chauhan, the UK based proponent of Khalistan. At that time he had few supporters amongst Canada’s 200,000 strong Sikh community. Gill was busy issuing currency, stamp and even passports of Khalistan. Jiwa, who visited Gill’s office in 1981, merely two days after the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) had inspected it, was the first reporter to interview any Khalistani activist in Canada. He found that the stamps, currency and passports of Khalistan were merely ornamental. The claim about a military training camp in British Columbia was only a rumour. Gill, sitting in front of a picture of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, tried to explain the rationale of Khalistan to Jiwa. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, according to Gill, was determined to wipe out the religious and cultural identity of the Sikhs. Khalistan, therefore, would provide a haven for Sikhs where they would no longer be drowned by the cultural influence of Hindu majority. The news of Khalistani secretariat in Vancouver perturbed Indira Gandhi. She gave a piece of mind to the then Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau, incidentally Justin Trudeau’s father, when the two leaders met during an economic conference in Nairobi, Kenya in 1981 (The Death of Air India Flight 182, P.75). How that Kingsway, Vancouver office closed down is a matter of speculation. Jiwa, informs that Gill later spilt from Jagjit Singh Chauhan’s Khalistan Liberation Movement and teamed up with Vancouver based Talwinder Singh Parmar, to form the Babbar Khalsa. Babbar Khalsa, modelled Khalistan upon Israel (P.76). Citing Israel as a model for Khalistan was an erroneous idea from the fundamental geographical point of view. Whereas Israel has 273-km long coastline, and access to two seas viz. the Mediterranean Sea and Red Sea, Punjab is completely a landlocked state. Around 99 percent of Israel’s trade is by sea, which is actually more than the global average of 90 percent. Khalistan could thus be compared more with Mongolia, except that the fact that Punjab, predominantly an agrarian state, is over-dependent on Indian Union for procurement of its wheat and rice production. Whereas India has strategic depth to step up its grain production with Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Odisha reporting record growth, the Punjabi cultivator would be ruined without the Government of India’s procurement policy in place. This is the exact reason that Khalistani supporters fear going into the details of proposed sovereign Khalistan. They will only discover Khali-Stan (empty space) there. That for four decades no remotely viable proposal for Khalistan has been advanced, itself proves how facile the idea is. It is a pity that Canada instead of countenancing these facts despite their strong research agencies, have been fawning at the Khalistan extremists whose success would actually ruin Punjab. The indifference of the Canadian authority towards ‘Kill India” posters circulated Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), targeting senior most envoys in Canada in recent months is not really surprising. Even the tableau glorifying the assassins of the late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi at a “Nagar Kirtan” in Brampton was passed off as “right to freedom of speech and expression”. Whatever be the Cold War compulsions of yesteryears, when the West might have used Khalistan as a tool to undermine a pro-USSR India, today India is a leading member of the free world. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has consistently shown his reverence for Sikhism. It’s high time Canada stopped taking sides of the Khalistanis, and respected the sovereignty and integrity of India. Canada has its own Anglo-French fault lines, which they would not like to open up to re-negotiations. The writer is author of the book “The Microphone Men: How Orators Created a Modern India” (2019) and an independent researcher based in New Delhi. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views. Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News, India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.