Who Was the Man Whose Killing Canada Says India Instigated?

The Sikh separatist whose killing in British Columbia this summer season has immediately set off a significant diplomatic dispute between Canada and India was a outstanding advocate of the creation of an unbiased nation, Khalistan, that would come with elements of India’s Punjab State.

The separatist, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, 45, had moved to Canada within the mid-Nineties, in accordance with Indian news stories, after a interval through which the Indian authorities was cracking down on the Sikh motion.

Decades later, the Indian authorities declared him a terrorist, accusing him of plotting a violent assault in India linked to his advocacy. And in June, two masked assailants killed him in entrance of a Sikh temple in Surrey, British Columbia, a metropolis on the border with Washington.

Mr. Nijjar was born within the district of Jalandhar within the North Indian state of Punjab. In Canada, he married, had two sons, labored as a plumber and have become the president of the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara, a temple in Surrey, in 2020.

Before finally gaining entry to Canada, the Canadian news outlet Global News reported, Mr. Nijjar had made an unsuccessful try to maneuver to the nation: submitting an utility as a refugee, which the Canadian authorities stated was partly fabricated, and, 11 days later, marrying a girl who sponsored him, an try the federal government additionally rejected.

He obtained his citizenship in March 2015, Marc Miller, Canada’s immigration minister, stated in a put up on X, the positioning previously known as Twitter. “I hope this dispels the baseless rumors that he was not a Canadian,” Mr. Miller added.

In an open letter in 2016, Mr. Nijjar declared: “I am a Sikh nationalist who believes in and supports Sikhs’ right to self-determination and independence of Indian occupied Punjab through a future referendum.”

The Indian authorities declared Mr. Nijjar a terrorist in 2020, saying it had proof that he was “involved in exhorting seditionary and insurrectionary imputations and also attempting to create disharmony among different communities in India.” The authorities stated he led a terrorist group banned in India, Khalistan Tiger Force.

In a separate criticism in 2018, India’s premier investigative company accused him of “conspiring and planning to carry out a major terrorist attack in India.” It additionally alleged that he deliberate to violently assault gatherings of the nationalist right-wing group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Last yr, Indian news shops reported that an Indian investigative company had provided a $12,000 reward for his arrest.

A Canadian journalist to whom Mr. Nijjar gave his final interview, Gurpreet Singh, painted a unique image, chatting with the unbiased Indian news outlet The Wire about a few of Mr. Nijjar’s neighborhood actions as a non secular chief.

Mr. Nijjar held particular prayers for “Muslims killed in the Christchurch bombings in 2019 in New Zealand,” Mr. Singh stated, and for Indigenous youngsters after the invention of unmarked graves of scholars at Canadian residential faculties. Mr. Nijjar, he stated, additionally argued for the discharge of a detained Indian human rights defender who used a wheelchair.

In Punjab, politicians and a journalist stated that regardless of India’s costs in opposition to him, Mr. Nijjar and his motion had been little identified.

“He went away many years ago, and nobody either remembers him here nor do they talk about him,” stated Raman Arora, a legislator from the governing celebration in Jalandhar. “The Khalistan movement has been dead here for decades.”

A veteran Punjabi journalist, Jagtar Singh, additionally stated that Mr. Nijjar “was and is totally unknown here” and that, in a long time of protecting Punjab, he “had never heard of or about him.”

Vineet Joshi, a Bharatiya Janata chief in Punjab, agreed that Mr. Nijjar was little identified within the area right now, and he blamed the Canadian authorities for encouraging individuals who harbored sentiments that he known as anti-India.

“Canada has become a hub of Khalistan activities, anti-India and a conspiracy to break India,” Mr. Joshi stated. “ There is freedom of speech there — no problem. But you cannot talk about the disintegration of another nation. Now, when Indian authorities raise objections, they are ignored by the Canadians.”

He additionally had a message for Canada: “They need to understand that this is not the same India. It is much stronger under the leadership of Modi.”

Back in British Columbia, at a memorial on Monday evening for Mr. Nijjar, his son Balraj Singh Nijjar known as on the Canadian prime minister to rally with allies and “put more pressure” on the Indian authorities. Mr. Nijjar’s dying continues to be a contemporary wound for the household, he added, chatting with reporters outdoors the temple.

“He had even called home like five minutes before it happened to get dinner ready,” his son stated. “It was kind of a big shock.”

Vjosa Isai contributed reporting from Toronto.