Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: With the buffeted Justine Trudeau, ahead of the next year’s parliamentary elections, acknowledging that he had no hard evidentiary proof when he alleged the involvement of the Indian government’s “agents” in the Hardeep Singh Nijjar killing, New Delhi has hardened its stance against Ottawa and singled out the current Prime Minister as “solely responsible” for damaging the bilateral relations.
The media reported on Thursday on what Trudeau testified before a Commission of Inquiry. Reacting promptly, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said it only “confirms” New Delhi’s consistent stand that Ottawa has “presented us no evidence” in support of the serious allegations Canada leveled against India and its diplomats.
Trudeau on Wednesday acknowledged that he had only intelligence and no “hard evidentiary proof” when he alleged the involvement of Indian government agents in the killing of Khalistani separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in June 2023.
Early on Thursday, responding to media queries related to Trudeau’s deposition, MEA spokesman Randhir Jaiswal said: “What we have heard today only confirms what we have been saying consistently all along — Canada has presented us no evidence whatsoever in support of the serious allegations that it has chosen to level against India and Indian diplomats.”
“The responsibility for the damage that this cavalier behavior has caused to India-Canada relations lies with Prime Minister Trudeau alone.”
Testifying before the public inquiry into foreign interference in federal electoral processes and democratic institutions, Trudeau claimed the Indian diplomats were collecting information on Canadians who disagreed with the Narendra Modi government and passing it to the highest levels within the Indian government and criminal organizations like the Lawrence Bishnoi gang.
India strongly rejected attempts by the Canadian authorities to link Indian agents with criminal gangs in Canada with official sources in New Delhi even saying that Ottawa’s assertion that it shared evidence with New Delhi in the Nijjar case was simply not true.
New Delhi also rejected Trudeau’s previous allegations that India was engaging in such activities, including carrying out covert operations targeting Canadian nationals in his country.
On Monday, India expelled six Canadian diplomats and also announced withdrawing its High Commissioner from Canada after dismissing Ottawa’s allegations linking the Indian envoy to a probe into the killing of Nijjar.
The escalation in diplomatic row between India and Canada is a major downturn in already frosty ties between the two nations.
The relations between the two countries nosedived after Trudeau’s allegations in September 2023 of the potential involvement of Indian agents in Nijjar’s killing.
New Delhi rejected Trudeau’s charges as absurd.
India has been maintaining that the main issue between the two countries is that of Canada giving space to pro-Khalistan elements operating from Canadian soil with impunity.
Nijjar, who was declared a terrorist by India, was shot dead outside a gurdwara in Surrey, British Columbia, on June 18 last year.