UK: Has Labour Party demoted Indian-origin shadow minister Preet Kaur Gill for Khalistan links?

UK’s Opposition Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer on Monday demoted Indian-origin shadow minister Preet Kaur Gill among others. Despite being the first British Sikh female member of Parliament in the House of Commons, Gill faced demotion reportedly after many called her out for her links with pro-Khalistani extremists. Kaur has long been linked to the Khalistan movement with her own father being the leader of Smethwick Gurudwara. The same temple which preet took Keir Starmer too and has a shrine to Khalistani terrorists, including the still UK proscribed terror group - Babbar Khalsa. Reportedly, she was also supported by the International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF), when they were a banned terrorist group as per UK law. She was supported by and then consequently supported the International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF), when they were a banned terrorist group as per UK law. ISYF was reconstituted into the Sikh Federation, which runs the All-Party Parliamentary (APPG) Group on Sikhs. The Parliamentary Chair of this Group is Preet Gill. Other members of this parliamentary community include labour MP Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi and Conservative MPs Caroline Nokes and Jane Stevenson. Apart from her ‘tweet delete’ controversy in 2021 in which she came under fire on social media over a tweet she later deleted that referred to a “Hindu terrorist” behind the act of violence at Golden Temple in Amritsar, Gill has reportedly known for public appearances and photographs with Pro-Khalistani activists. Just a few days before labour party sacked her, tweets had emerged from a UK-based political analyst Chris Blackburn in which he went on to accuse Keir Starmer for backing radical Khalistan. In his tweets, Blackburn posted pictures of Gill and Starmer with alleged pro-Khalistani activists. He wrote: “Does @Keir_Starmer back radical Khalistan? Here is Sir Keir at the GNG Smethwick. A hotbed of Khalistan radicalism. In 2006, Khalistanis kicked out Vice President Ravinder Singh Powar for trying to keep radicals out of the Gurdwara”.

In the same thread of tweets, Blackburn mocked British MP and shadow rail minister Tanmanjit Singh Dhesi saying he is also known to pro-Khalistanis as he had in the past helped them in starting their own TV channel, that was later shut down, “Dhesi knows GNG Smethwick is a hive of Khalistan radicalism in the UK. GNG Smethwick helped to launch KTV that was shut down by @Ofcom for glorifying radicalism and murder,” Blackburn wrote in the tweet. The next day, Blackburn claimed to have received response from Labour figures who allegedly told him that Sir Starmer didn’t ‘actually’ endorsed Sikh Manifesto despite being photographed with Pro-Khalistan extremists.

The tweet read, “Labour figures and activists have told me that @Keir_Starmer “didn’t actually endorse the Sikh Manifesto,” despite being photographed with it at GNG Smethwick in 2020. The manifesto was written by a Khalistani pictured with Starmer. Jas Singh and others were thrust upon Starmer by Preet Gill MP”.

Meanwhile, after being demoted, Gill reiterated her support for Starmer’s leadership on Social media. “It has been a great privilege to serve as the Shadow Secretary for International Development through a tumultuous few years: a global pandemic that has set the clock back on years of progress, the UK’s disastrous exit from Afghanistan, and Putin’s abhorrent war in Ukraine," the Birmingham Edgbaston MP tweeted. “I am proud of our work we have done holding the government to account: over its disastrous decision to abolish DfID and mismanaged aid cuts that have harmed so many lives…It couldn’t be clearer that we need to turf out this rotten, zombie government and put a mission-driven Labour government in power. It is as clear today as it was three years ago when I supported his campaign to be leader, that Keir Starmer is the Prime Minister Britain needs," she also said. The development comes ahead of the general election expected next year. Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner has now been appointed as the shadow levelling up secretary. Starmer handed promotions to Pakistani-origin Birmingham Ladywood MP Shabana Mahmood as the new shadow justice secretary, and Sri Lankan origin Thangam Debbonaire as the ew shadow culture secretary.