Khalistan narrative is back with a bang via Canada close to 2024 Lok Sabha polls in India as two countries expel diplomats

 

Khalistan narrative is back with a bang via Canada close to 2024 Lok Sabha polls in India as two countries expel diplomats

Ground Zero

Jagtar Singh

With parliamentary elections a few months away in 2024, India’s relations with Canada enter troubled waters on the issues relating to Sikh religio-political discourse revolving around sovereign Sikh homeland of Khalistan in Indian Punjab.

Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, after returning from India where he participated in G20 conclave but received cold, has kicked up storm by revelation in Canada’s House of Common’s saying he had credible information that India could be linked to the killing of Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjer who headed a gurdwara in Sikh dominated Surrey in British Columbia. India had declared him a wanted terrorist.

“Any involvement of a foreign government in the killing of a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil is an unacceptable violation of our sovereignty”, Trudeau told Parliament on Monday adding, “In the strongest possible terms I continue to urge the government of India to cooperate with Canada to get to the bottom of this matter”.

It is pertinent to mention that India has been accusing Canada of encouraging the Sikh separatists by allowing them to stage protests in India. Canada has defended saying the country allows democratic and peaceful activity on its soil. Similar argument has also been extended by UK to similar protests by India where too the Sikh separatists have been active.

India rejected as “absurd and motivated” the allegations levelled by Trudeau.

Within hours, both countries expelled each other’s diplomats with Canada taking the lead.

Here is an important dimension cited by CBC News: “A senior government source told CBC News that Trudeau has briefed the leaders of some of Canada’s closest allies about the case, including UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, French President Emmanuel Macron and U.D. President Joe Biden.”

What is all the more important is that Trudeau had conveyed the accusation “personally and directly to prime minister Modi” and India’s security agencies during his G20 visit.

This means India could have been apprehending this information being made public by Trudeau, especially after he was met with total indifference.

It is pertinent to mention here that the Dal Khalsa and Akali Dal (Amritsar) had staged protest in Amritsar on July 1 last with banners that accused India as suspect in Nijjer’s killing.

As per the media reports, Canada is a member of Five Eye group of countries that share intelligence. The other four are USA, UK, Australia and New Zealand.

Al Jazeera has quoted United Kingdom saying “It is in close touch with Canadian partners about “serious allegations’ from Ottawa that the Indian government was involved in the murder of a Sikh separatist leader in British Columbia province earlier this year”. Similarly, Australia and USA too have expressed “deep concern”.

The important dimension is both long term and short term impact on geo politics of this storm that has been kicked up. India is not only the biggest democracy by sheer volume but also one of the biggest markets for the developed nations. Moreover, India has been perceived as balance to geo-politics against China that has been expanding its area of influence. Modi has been projecting India as Vishwaguru. The developing situation is a set back to that projection.

The immediate issue is that of potential of Khalistan factor to shape up electoral narrative in the run up to the forthcoming parliamentary elections in 2024.

The Khalistan issue can play  its role in the mobilization of a section in support of Narendra Modi to neautralise the non-political factors like inflation that too can play key role in shaping the voter behaviour.

The Sikhs as a community are in  a unique position. The birth place of this fifth largest religion is in Pakistani Punjab. Canada is now the next destination of the people from Punjab in general and the Sikhs in particular.

Punjab is the state that is going to be directly affected.

The basic issue, however, that is revival of Khalistan narrative that was perceived to have gone into hibernation.

This issue never died out and there are reasons for it.

The issues that are associated with the struggle that started in Punjab in 1980 are still alive.

The government of India has not come out even with the basic information as to how many people were killed in the avoidable army attack code-named Operation Bluestar on the Darbar Sahib (Golden Temple) complex in June 1984.

The initiative for closure has to come from the government.

The minimum that the government can do is to declassify entire record from 1978 to 1992 relating to this struggle.