Why British Columbia wants gang terror title suspected of Indian government tie
The Sikh community in British Columbia marks the two-week anniversary of the murder of President Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who allegedly the role of a high-profile Indian gang is attracting attention.
Four Indian nationals are accused and awaiting trial, but the mastermind behind the killing remains free – a fact that sparked anger during a protest in Vancouver on Wednesday.
“India should not be able to get impunity by killing Canadians on Canadian soil,” the Sikh Federation of Canada told Global News.
Just the day after Canada and India agreed to rebuild diplomatic ties, Prime Minister Mark Carney chaired his Indian counterpart, Narenda Modi, whose spy agency in Canada released a report tying the Indian state directly to the organized crime team in Canada.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Agency's annual report cites evidence from the RCMP, linking Indian government agents to “crime network seeding violence in Canadian South Asian communities.”
It added that India's role in the killings of Nijjar “is significantly escalating in India's suppression efforts”.
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National security experts point out that Lawrence Bishnoi gangs are involved.
“They have to find people to do these dirty behaviors,” said Daniel Stanton, director of the National Security Program at the University of Ottawa Institute of Professional Development.
He added that the use of gangs has made the government “somewhat denial”.
“Through agents, in this case, they basically created a wave of crime in Canada, attributed it to a specific community,” he said.
The National Investigation Agency of India (NIA) described the group as a criminal gang led by Lawrence Bishnoi, whose lawyers say he competed for more than 40 cases, accusing him of crimes such as murder and blackmail.
Bishnoy himself is a law graduate in Punjab and has been in jail for more than a decade. The NIA claims he runs his joint organization through a network of employees through a network of prisons and international partners in different states.
The World Sikh Organization said Bishnoi recently appeared in Indian media “declaring himself an Indian nationalist” and he also vowed to oppose the independent homeland of Punjab in India, sought by some Sikh activists, including Nijjar.
Sources told Global News that the Bisnowy gang is believed to be related to the Nigarh killing.
The Sikh group also killed a Mississauga, a recent Ontario-based businessman, for its recent resistance to blackmail attempts.
“We are thinking about the real crisis in Canada, where businessmen across Canada are blackmailed by Indian gangs, and the problem here is really not just the isolated Indian gangs,” said Balpreet Singh of the World Sikh Organization.
“The problem here is that the head of this gang has been in prison for the past decade.
British Columbia Prime Minister David Eby on Tuesday called on the federal government to designate the Bishnoi gang as a terrorist group.
The Sikh group said it was a good start, but it wasn't enough.
They hope to conduct a public investigation into India's transnational repression to allow Canada to end any intelligence sharing with India, as well as the consequences for anyone involved in international crimes – regardless of their position in the government.
“The antennae stretches all the way to the top,” said Balpreet Singh.
“So, targeted sanctions against Indian government members are called related to this gang.”
– Files with Stewart Bell, Jeff Semple and Andrew Russel and Reuters from Aaron McArthur, Global
& Copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
