Amid ongoing diplomatic tension between the two countries, India on Thursday said it had sought extradition of Lawrence Bishnoi gang members from Canada a few years back but it has not yet responded.
Making this assertion here, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal also said similar extradition requests of syndicates linked to the Bishnoi gang were made recently as well, but did not get any response from Canada. He also informed there are 26 extradition requests from India pending with the Canadian side for a decade or so.
The MEA gave names of Gurjit Singh, Gurjinder Singh, Arshdeep Singh Gill, Lakhbir Singh Landa, Gurpreet Singh for extradition, saying that the members of the Bishnoi gang were among them.
“We informed Canada about the Lawrence Bishnoi gang and its syndicates and requested their provisional arrest and extradition some years back, and also recently. However, there has been no response from Canada so far”, he said during a media briefing.
“We had shared some requests with the Canadian side for the arrest of those from Lawrence Bishnoi’s gang. They haven’t taken any action on our core concerns. There is a political motive also behind this,” Jaiswal said.
He also reiterated that Canada did not share any evidence in connection with the killing of Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.
“We have made our position very clear on this particular matter. You would have seen that several press releases have been issued in the last two days putting out our position. Since September 2023, the Canadian government has not shared any shred of information with us”, he asserted.
The Ministry also said Canada always brought forth ‘freedom of speech’ as their argument whenever India sought action against anti-India and separatist elements.
The government’s statement came a day after Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau named gangster Lawrence Bishnoi, who was earlier mentioned by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) for being allegedly involved in Nijjar’s murder in September last year.
Trudeau alleged that Indian diplomats were collecting information on Canadians and passing it to the Lawrence Bishnoi gang. Trudeau, who testified before the country’s foreign interference inquiry, claimed that the Canadian agencies tried to work behind the scenes with India before he went public with the allegations in the Nijjar killing.
Jaiswal also said the current diplomatic row with Canada has been precipitated by the Trudeau government’s “baseless” allegations, and reiterated that “no evidence” has been shared in support of Ottawa’s serious allegations against New Delhi.
At his weekly briefing, the spokesperson said Prime Minister Trudeau’s own admission during a public inquiry tells the value of allegations levelled against India.
Testifying before the public inquiry into foreign interference in federal electoral processes and democratic institutions, Trudeau on Wednesday acknowledged that he had only intelligence and no “hard evidentiary proof” when he alleged the involvement of Indian government agents in Nijjar’s killing last year.
Early on Thursday, the MEA reacted to this and said what it has heard only “confirms” New Delhi’s consistent stand that Canada has “presented us no evidence” in support of the serious allegations Ottawa chose to level against India and Indian diplomats.
During the briefing, Jaiswal reiterated that so far no evidence has been shared by Canada. “The current crisis (in India-Canada relationship) has been precipitated by the Trudeau government’s baseless allegations,” he said.
Diplomatic ties between India and Canada soured further earlier this week when Canada announced that top Indian diplomats in Ottawa were ‘persons of interest’, as far as its investigation into Nijjar’s killing was concerned.
India rejected Canada’s stand and, in retaliation, recalled six of its top diplomats from Canada, including High Commissioner Sanjay Kumar Verma. In a tit-for-tat series of actions, Canada expelled six Indian diplomats.
