B.C.’s premier has downplayed considerations raised in an RCMP report concerning the Indian authorities’s suspected ties to a gang blamed for extortion and homicide in Canada.
Throughout a trade mission to India, David Eby responded to questions on an RCMP doc that stated the Bishnoi gang was “performing on behalf of the Indian authorities.”
Requested concerning the newly-released report obtained by World Information, Eby stated it was a “abstract of publicly obtainable information reviews from greater than a 12 months in the past.”
“This was not an RCMP intelligence report,” he stated from Mumbai on Wednesday. His workplace didn’t reply to follow-up questions from World Information.
However a former intelligence analyst who reviewed the doc disagreed with Eby’s characterization, and a Canadian Sikh group referred to as the premier’s assertion “deceptive and harmful.”
“The RCMP and senior Canadian officers have publicly acknowledged that they possess proof linking the Bishnoi gang to the federal government of India,” the World Sikh Group of Canada stated.
“This isn’t based mostly on a compilation of newspaper articles; it is a nationwide safety evaluation. Dismissing it echoes Indian authorities speaking factors, trivializes transnational repression, and places British Columbians in danger.”
Eby has come below hearth from Canadian Sikh teams and the Conservative opposition for embarking on an Indian commerce mission amid police allegations linking the federal government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to violence in Canada.
Amid an extortion epidemic in B.C., Alberta and Ontario final June, Eby referred to as on the federal authorities to checklist the Bishnoi gang as a terrorist group.
RCMP report on the Lawrence Bishnoi gang and its alleged ties to the federal government of India.
World Information
An RCMP report launched to World Information on Monday that gave the impression to be a response to the premier’s plea repeatedly famous the Bishnoi gang’s suspected ties to India’s authorities.
“The Bishnoi crime group is understood to make use of violence to additional their felony enterprise, whereas allegedly performing on behalf of the Indian authorities,” the RCMP nationwide safety department wrote.
Get every day Nationwide information
Get the day’s prime information, political, financial, and present affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox as soon as a day.
The premier stated the “paragraph in query that was cited within the preliminary information report was a abstract of publicly obtainable information articles from the October 2024 interval, allegations we had been conscious of.”
However the quote in query was not sourced to a information report, and the doc referred to Eby’s June 2025 name to checklist the Bishnoi gang as a terrorist group, that means it was written a minimum of eight months after October 2024.
Whereas the three-page report footnotes a number of information articles, it additionally sources a Public Security Canada hyperlink that accuses Indian brokers of accumulating info “used to focus on members of the South Asian neighborhood.”
Former Canadian Safety Intelligence Service analyst Phil Gurski stated it was frequent observe for intelligence reviews to footnote information sources which are in keeping with labeled info.
Studies used to position teams on Canada’s terrorist checklist, for instance, “are written by CSIS and based mostly on intel, however use open supply that’s in keeping with the intel because the itemizing is public,” he stated.
The RCMP report was labeled as Protected A, and a number of other sections had been redacted — suggesting it was greater than a abstract of stories gadgets. A warning on the backside cautioned that sharing the doc was unlawful.
“The dealing with and storage of this doc should adjust to dealing with and storage tips established by the federal government of Canada for labeled info,” it stated.
“Failure to adjust to this caveat will represent a breach of RCMP coverage and federal regulation.”
The report is in keeping with earlier authorities statements concerning the suspected ties between the federal government of India and the Bishnoi organized crime group.
Nationwide safety adviser Nathalie Drouin testified in October 2025 that “senior ranges of the Indian authorities” had directed “the fee of significant felony actions towards Indo-Canadians via the kinetic use of Lawrence Bishnoi’s organized crime community.”
Below Prime Minister Mark Carney, the federal government has additionally taken a conciliatory strategy to India because it seeks to diversify Canada’s commerce companions amid President Donald Trump’s commerce struggle.
Though Ottawa listed the Bishnoi gang as a terrorist group in September, for instance, the profile on the Public Security Canada web site makes no point out of the gang’s alleged ties to India’s authorities.
“The Bishnoi gang has been linked to plenty of violent crimes and murders in India,” Public Security Canada advised World Information when questioned concerning the omission.
“Indian authorities have already laid a number of expenses towards the gang; plenty of gang members have additionally been sentenced to jail, and its chief has been in jail in India since 2014.”
“Addressing transnational crime is a precedence for each Canada and India. Because the gang has networks in each nations, Canada stays dedicated to working with our key companions to counter terrorist organizations and their fundraisers.”
India has lengthy complained to Canada about its failure to arrest members of the Khalistan motion, which advocates independence for India’s Sikh-majority Punjab state.
Canadian authorities imagine that Indian brokers took issues into their very own fingers, ordering the homicide of pro-Khalistan chief Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey, B.C., on June 18, 2023.
The 4 suspected killers had been arrested in Might 2024. World Information has reported that Canada obtained intercepted communications linking senior Indian officers to the capturing.
A lot of different suspected assassination plots, principally concentrating on pro-Khalistan activists, have additionally been uncovered, in line with the RCMP.
On Oct. 14, 2024, RCMP Commissioner Michael Duheme stated Indian officers had been linked to an array of violent crimes, prompting Canada to expel six Indian diplomats.
Eby stated he was “extraordinarily cautious” earlier than travelling to India, and had acquired briefings from the Canadian navy and the Canadian Safety Intelligence Service.
“We have to guarantee justice for Mr. Nijjar, for his household, for the neighborhood,” he stated. “And on the similar time, we are able to’t sit round whereas our commonplace of life is eroded and our economic system is eroded by the choices of the president of the US.
“India goes be the third-largest economic system on this planet. And Canadians and British Columbians will solely profit from a detailed relationship with India that features mutual respect between the 2 nations for our sovereignty and for our considerations, that are on each side about points backwards and forwards between the 2 nations, and people are being resolved on the federal degree.
“So that is very delicate stuff.”
Stewart.Bell@globalnews.ca
