New Delhi:

The ban on pro-Khalistan group Sikhs For Justice (SFJ), founded by US-based lawyer Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, has been extended by the Centre for five years for its relentless anti-India activities.
In a notification issued on Tuesday, the Union Home Ministry said SFJ was declared a banned organisation five years ago under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act for its anti-national activities.

The notification said the Central government is of the opinion that SFJ continues to indulge in activities which are prejudicial to the integrity and security of the country and is involved in anti-national and subversive activities in Punjab and elsewhere, intended to disrupt the sovereignty and territorial integrity of India.

It said SFJ is in close touch with militant outfits and activists, and is supporting a violent form of extremism and militancy in Punjab and elsewhere to carve out a sovereign Khalistan out of territory of India.

The pro-Khalistan separatist group is encouraging and aiding the activities for the secession of a part of the Indian territory and supporting separatist groups fighting for this purpose in India and elsewhere by indulging in activities and articulations intended to disrupt the sovereignty and territorial integrity of India.

The Home Ministry said the government feels that if the unlawful activities of SFJ are not curbed and controlled immediately, it is likely to escalate its subversive activities including attempts to carve out a Khalistan nation out of the territory of India by destabilising the government established by law.

The SFJ continues to advocate the secession of Punjab from India and the formation of Khalistan, it continues to propagate anti-national and separatist sentiments prejudicial to the territorial integrity and security of the country and escalates secessionist movements, and support militancy and incite violence in the country, the notification said.

“Now, therefore, in exercise of the powers conferred by sub-sections (1) and (3) of section 3 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 (37 of 1967), the central government hereby extends the declaration of the Sikhs For Justice as an unlawful association and directs that this notification shall, subject to any order that may be made under section 4 of the said Act, have effect for a further period of five years from 10th day of July, 2024,” it said.

SFJ was founded by US-based Pannun, who was also declared as a terrorist by the government. It had also carried out a campaign for a referendum for a separate Khalistan about three years ago.

Pannun, who holds dual citizenship of the US and Canada, is wanted in India on terror charges.

Last month, an Indian national, Nikhil Gupta, was extradited to the US for his alleged involvement in the plot to kill Pannun on American soil.

The group’s primary objective is to establish an “independent and sovereign country” in Punjab. It openly espouses the cause of Khalistan and in that process challenges the sovereignty and territorial integrity of India, an official said.

SFJ was first declared a banned organisation under the UAPA in 2019. 

New Delhi:

In an explosive turn of events Monday, Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena has called for an anti-terror probe into allegations Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal received political funding from the banned Sikhs For Justice group founded by wanted terrorist Gurpatwant Pannun.

Mr Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party hit back swiftly via senior leader Saurabh Bhardwaj, who dismissed the call for a probe by the National Investigation Agency as a “conspiracy” against the party and its leader. “LG sir is an agent of the BJP… This is another big conspiracy against Chief Minister Kejriwal at the behest of the BJP,” he said in a brief statement.

The allegations – the latest in a long-running and fierce war between the AAP and the Bharatiya Janata Party in power at the centre – come less than three weeks before the national capital votes in the general election. In 2019 the BJP won all Delhi’s seven seats.

In a detailed letter to the Union Home Secretary, Mr Saxena referred to a video (which he said was enclosed with the missive) in which Pannun declares Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party “received a staggering amount of $16 million in funding from Khalistani groups…” 

“… Kejriwal purportedly promised to facilitate release of Devender Pal Bhullar, in return for substantial financial backing from Khalistani factions to Aam Aadmi Party…” the LG’s letter said, citing a complaint from a Hindu religious body and tweets by a former AAP worker.

The AAP boss also reportedly received money to “espouse pro-Khalistani sentiments”.

Bhullar, a former professor, was convicted in the 1993 Delhi bomb blasts case. In 2001 he was given the death sentence but that was later commuted to life imprisonment.

Arvind Kejriwal is already in jail over corruption charges linked to the alleged Delhi liquor policy scam that is being investigated by the Enforcement Directorate and Central Bureau of Investigation. Mr Kejriwal and the AAP have denied all charges, labelling them acts of “political vendetta” by the BJP ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha election.

Mr Kejriwal has challenged his arrest – he was arrested March 21 – in the Supreme Court. He was the third top AAP leader to be arrested in this case, after ex-Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh. Mr Singh is out on bail.

Arvind Kejriwal has argued that his arrest was illegal since there is no evidence linking him to the alleged crime. The top court, which is still hearing the case, has said it will consider bail for Mr Kejriwal so he can campaign for his party for the forthcoming Delhi election.

A mural features the image of late Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who was slain on the grounds of the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara temple in June 2023, in Surrey, British Columbia, Canada on September 18, 2023.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Sikh independence advocate whose killing two months ago is at the centre of a widening breach between India and Canada, was called a human rights activist by Sikh organisations and a criminal by India’s Government.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on September 18 that his government was investigating “credible allegations” that Indian Government agents were linked to the June 18 slaying, when Nijjar was gunned down outside a Sikh cultural centre in Surrey, British Columbia.

India has denied any role in the killing, calling the allegations absurd.

Nijjar, 45 when he died, was a prominent member of a movement to create an independent Sikh homeland known as Khalistan, and was organising an unofficial referendum among the Sikh diaspora with the organisation Sikhs For Justice.

He also owned a plumbing business and served as president of a Sikh temple or gurdwara in suburban Vancouver, where banners hung with his face promoting the referendum on September 19. In a 2016 interview with the Vancouver Sun he responded dismissively to reports in Indian media that he was suspected of leading a terrorist cell.

“This is garbage — all the allegations. I am living here 20 years, right? Look at my record. There is nothing. I am a hard worker. I own my own business in the plumbing,” Nijjar told the newspaper. At the time, he said he was too busy to take part in diaspora politics.

Following his death, the World Sikh Organisation of Canada called Nijjar an outspoken supporter of Khalistan who “often led peaceful protests against the violation of human rights actively taking place in India and in support of Khalistan”.

Nijjar was a wanted man in India, which has for years seen Sikh separatists abroad as a security threat.

In 2016, Indian media reported that Nijjar was suspected of masterminding a bombing in the Sikh-majority State of Punjab and training terrorists in a small city southeast of Vancouver. He denied the allegations.

In 2020, Indian authorities claimed Nijjar was a member of a banned militant group and designated him a terrorist. That year, they also filed a criminal case against him as farmers, many from Punjab, camped out on the edges of New Delhi to protest controversial agriculture laws. The Indian Government initially tried to discredit the protests by associating them with Sikh separatists, filing a number of such cases against Sikh activists in India and abroad.

Last year, Indian authorities accused Nijjar of involvement in an alleged attack on a Hindu priest in India and announced a reward of about $16,000 for information leading to his arrest.

The modern Sikh independence movement reaches back to the 1940s but eventually became an armed insurgency that shook the country in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1984, then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ordered a raid to capture armed separatists taking refuge in Sikhism’s holiest shrine.

The raid killed hundreds of people, and two of Gandhi’s Sikh bodyguards assassinated her shortly after. In response, anti-Sikh riots took place across India in which members of the minority were dragged out of their homes and killed. The insurgency was eventually suppressed in a crackdown during which thousands of people were killed, but the goal of Sikh independence still has support among some in northern India and in the Sikh diaspora.

More recently, the Hindu nationalist-led government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has cracked down on both non-Hindu rights movements and dissidents.

Sikh diaspora activism has been a source of tension between India and Canada for years. Canada has the largest population of Sikhs outside India, and India has repeatedly accused it of tolerating “terrorists and extremists”.

Canadian police said Nijjar was shot as he was leaving the parking lot of the Sikh temple where he served as president in British Columbia. He suffered multiple gunshot wounds and died at the scene.

After the killing, a lawyer and spokesperson for Sikhs For Justice, Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, said Nijjar had been a target of threats because of his activism. His killing was the second in two years of a prominent member of the Sikh community in Canada.

Mr. Pannun said he had spoken to Nijjar by phone the day before he was killed and that Nijjar had told him that Canadian intelligence had warned him that his life was at risk.

Nearly a week after Nijjar’s slaying, about 200 protesters from Canada’s Sikh community gathered in front of the Indian Consulate in Vancouver to demonstrate. Many of the protesters were convinced that Nijjar’s killing was linked to his calls for an independent Sikh state.

“He was a loving man, a hard-working man, a family man,” said Gurkeerat Singh, one of the protesters.

On September 18, Moninder Singh, a spokesperson for the British Columbia Sikh Gurdwara Council, told Canada’s CTV that the wave of support for Nijjar seen after his death was an indication of how he was seen in the community.

“It shook the community across the entire world, including in Punjab,” Mr. Singh said.
“The community is shattered. There are very, very high emotions,” Sukh Dhaliwal, a member of Parliament who represents Surrey, said days after the killing.