Fourteen bullets were fired into a house near Victoria. Edmonton building burned by arsonists carrying a red jerrycan. A 39-year-old man was found dead in a Winnipeg duplex.
The cases are among many across Canada that were allegedly part of the Indian government’s crackdown on activists and opponents of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Six diplomats and officials posted to Indian missions in Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver have been identified as persons of interest in the violence.
On Monday, the Canadian government expelled them over alleged crimes against members of the Khalistan movement, which supports the independence of India’s Sikh-majority Punjab.
But Global News has learned that the police have evidence that the operation is going to the top: It is suspected that it was approved by Modi’s right-hand man Amit Shah, the second most powerful politician in India.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with Home Minister Amit Shah, in Ahmedabad, India, May 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Ajit Solanki).
“I think there’s no doubt that this was all from the top,” said Dan Stanton, a former Canadian Security Intelligence Service officer.
“I mean, who’s going to go ahead with this, especially putting together missions here in Canada, without knowing that it’s supported from above?”
“I think a rogue is very unlikely.”
He also pointed out that Modi had said in his speech in May, “This is the new India, the new India is coming to your home to kill you.”
The RCMP took a surprising step on Monday to warn Canadians about India’s alleged involvement in “serious crimes in Canada.”
Working out of two large Indian houses and its high commission in Ottawa, the agents used extortion and money to convince victims to take jobs, sources said.
Generally, members of the South Asian community were denied visas to return to India unless they did as instructed.
Duties assigned to them include screening Sikh individuals and organizations, and reporting information back to officials at Indian embassies.
That intelligence was then brought back to India and used to target Khalistan activists and other opponents of the Modi government, according to sources.
Organized crime groups based in India are tapped to carry out the final part of the plan: attacks ranging from arson and drive-by shootings to murder.
“Despite legal action, vandalism has continued, posing a serious threat to our public safety,” the RCMP said in a statement.
“We came to a point where we felt it necessary to confront the Indian government and inform the public about the serious findings revealed by our investigation.”
The RCMP did not list the “multiple ongoing investigations” it has linked to the Indian government, but Global News confirmed some of them in cities across the country.
Among them are a series of robberies and arsons in Edmonton that police are investigating under the name Project Gaslight, and the killing of Sukhdool Singh Gill in Winnipeg on September 20, 2023.
Others include the Sept. 2 shooting that targeted the Colwood, BC home of a Punjabi singer, and a similar drive-by shooting in Brampton, Ont., in February.
Inderjeet Singh Gosal, a pro-Khalistan activist in Brampton, Ont., said police warned him that his life was in danger.
A handout
The Brampton home of Inderjeet Singh Gosal, a Sikh-Canadian activist who is organizing a referendum on independence for Khalistan.
He took the job after his predecessor, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, was gunned down outside Surrey, BC’s Guru Nanak Sikh Temple on June 18, 2023.
Four suspects were arrested in Alberta and Ontario in May. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau linked the killing to the Indian government.
The police visited Gosal in August and warned him that his life was also in danger.
In an interview, Gosal said that the gunshots fired at his home and the threat to his life were “100 percent part” of the Indian government’s plan, and that investigators had told him as much.
“That’s exactly what they were telling me,” he said. Investigators gave him “a lot of details” about the contact, he said, but he could not discuss the details publicly.
“The RCMP and CSIS, they told me clearly that yes, it was directly linked to that,” he said when asked if his case was among those linked to Indian government agents in Canada.
He mentioned that the response on social media about what happened to him confirmed the political crime. “They said, ‘yes, this was a message, we are sending you a message.'”
“What makes me happy is that the truth is coming out. It shows the real background of India, their real side,” he said. “It hurts them a lot because it shows their true colors.”
“It goes directly to Modi’s right-hand man,” he added.
A Hindu national, Amit Shah is a close confidant of Modi and helped secure the 2014 election victory that brought him and his Bharatiya Janata Party to power.
Shah was serving as the home minister in Gujarat state when he was arrested in 2010 for the kidnapping and murder of a Muslim couple.
He denied it and, after three months in custody, was released in 2014. He then rose between the BJP and Modi.
He became Modi’s home minister in 2019, putting him in charge of internal security. The BJP website credits him for reducing terrorism to “rare incidents.”
According to his profile on the BJP website, Shah “views fragile security as a major obstacle to the development of society, the country and the state.”
But he is suspected to have signed off on a project targeting Khalistan activists in Canada, as India denies the allegations.
In a statement on Monday, the Indian government said it “strongly rejects these allegations and engages with the Trudeau government’s political agenda which focuses on vote bank politics.”
