India-Canada row: How ties hit rock bottom between the two countries

In response to the escalating tensions over the execution of a Sikh secessionist on American soil, India and Canada have fired their best diplomats, setting a new lower in a previously cordial relationship.

While previous disagreements have strained relationships, few have reached this level of available confrontation.

India detonated a nuclear weapon in 1974, causing outrage in Canada, which claimed India had only extracted plutonium from a French furnace for peaceful purposes.

Canada and India’s nuclear power program received a significant cooling in their bilateral relations.

Yet neither expelled their top diplomats like they did on Monday as the row intensified over last year’s assassination of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canada-based Sikh leader labelled a terrorist by India.

Following PM Justin Trudeau’s state that American police were looking into claims of Indian officials ‘ direct involvement in the June 2023 shooting, the tit-for-tat evictions came.

Canadian police further accused Indian agents of involvement in “homicides, extortion and violent acts” targeting pro-Khalistan supporters advocating a separate Sikh homeland in India. Delhi rejected the allegations as “preposterous”.

There are some 770, 000 Sikhs living in Canada, home to the largest Sikh community outside the American position of Punjab. Relations between the two nations are still strained due to Sikh independence, which is rooted in a terrible insurrection in India in the 1980s and early 1990s. Delhi has harshly criticized Canada for ignoring the pro-Khalistan movements within its borders. Canada, says India, is aware of local Khalistani organizations and has been monitoring them for centuries.

“This relationship has been on a downward trajectory for several years, but it’s now hit rock bottom,” Michael Kugelman of the Wilson Center, an American think-tank, told the BBC.

” Officially laying out extremely serious and detailed claims, withdrawing ministers and top officials, releasing political claims with blistering speech. This is unknown country, even for this troubled relationship”.

Other experts concur that this is a historical turning point.

” This represents a significant drop in Canada-India ties under the Trudeau state”, added Ryan Touhey, writer of Conflicting Visions, Canada and India in the Cold War World.

A history teacher at St Jerome’s University in Waterloo, Mr Touhey notes that a crucial success of former prime minister Stephen Harper’s state was fostering a “prolonged phase of reconciliation” between Canada and India, moving past problems related to Khalistan and nuclear development.

Given the significant presence of the Indian community in Canada, a particular emphasis was placed on the value of commerce, education, and people-to-people connections. Additionally, it is important to mention that the Khalistan conflict had appeared to have vanished since the start of the decade. It has now unexpectedly started to erupt.

Canada’s allegations have come at a time when Trudeau appears to be battling anti-incumbency at home with elections barely a year away. A new poll by Ipsos reveals only 28% overall think Trudeau deserves re-election and only 26% would vote for the Liberals. India’s foreign ministry, in bruising remarks on Monday, ascribed Canada’s allegations to the “political agenda of the Trudeau government that is centred around vote bank politics”.

In 2016, Trudeau told reporters that he had more Sikhs – four – in his cabinet than Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s in India. Sikhs exert considerable influence in Canadian politics, occupying 15 seats in the House of Commons – over 4% – while representing only about 2% of the population. Many of these seats are in key battlegrounds during national elections. In 2020, Trudeau had expressed his concern over protests by farmers in India, drawing sharp criticism by Delhi.

” I believe that this issue will, in general, give the impression that this is a prime minister who seems to be switching from one disaster to another. More precisely, within the Indo-Canadian area it may well damage more than ever”, says Mr Touhey.

He explains that there are now more than 100 Hindus and refugees from southern India and Gujarat, which were once predominately Punjabis and Sikhs, in Canada.

They are happy of India’s economic change since the 1990s, and they will not tolerate Sikh independence. Generally, the Democrats have been quite socially productive with the Sikh voting, particularly in European Columbia”.

However, Mr Touhey does n’t feel that the crisis with India has to do with vote bank politics.

He believes that this is more a result of the American state “repeatedly missing signals from Delhi regarding American concerns about pro-Khalistani elements in Canada.”

” I have a very different authorities in Delhi that is willing to act forcefully, right or wrong, to rein in perceived domestic risks,” says Mr. Touhey, but after years of pleading with American institutions to get American concerns over pro-Khalistani components in Canada, they feel like they are back to square one.

Mr Kugelman echoes a similar sentiment.

There are many factors at play that contribute to the rapid decline in bilateral ties. This includes a fundamental disconnect: what India views, or projects, as a dangerous threat is seen by Canada as mere activism and dissent protected by free speech. And neither is willing to make concessions”, he says.

All may not be lost. The two countries have a long relationship. Canada hosts one of the largest Indian-origin communities, with 1.3 million residents, or about 4 % of its population. India, which will be Canada’s top 10th largest trading partner in 2022, is a priority market for the country. Since 2018, India has been Canada’s main source of foreign students.

“On the one hand, the relationship is far more broad-based than ever thanks to the size of the diaspora, the diversity of that diaspora and the increase in bilateral trade, increased student exchanges – albeit this last point has become a problematic issue for the Trudeau government as well,” says Mr Touhey.

” So, I think those people-to-people links will be okay. I do n’t believe there is much the current Canadian government can do because it is almost in its final year, with an election scheduled for at least by the fall of 2025, on a high bilateral level.

For the moment, though, things look pretty bad, experts say.

” Delhi now makes the same allegations against Canada that it has consistently made against Pakistan. It accuses Ottawa of sheltering and sponsoring anti-India terrorists. However, recently, the language making these accusations against Canada has been more offensive than it has been against Pakistan. And that’s saying something”, says Mr Kugelman.

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