The Air India Bombing of 1985 was the deadliest aviation terrorist attack before 9/11, and it has a deep connection to Canada. The Khalistan Movement, which seeks to create an independent Sikh state in Punjab, India, has been based in Canada for decades.
Guru Patwant Singh Pannu The person wants to break India into pieces, wants Khalistan, and keeps threatening Indians every day from Canadian soil. India has declared as a terrorist to him. There are not just one or two, but 22 criminal cases on him. He is the chief of Sikhs for Justice Organization which plans attacks on India from Canada and America. They wanted to target the World Cup finals. They have given a message to their Khalistani supporters to wave the Khalistani flag on the day of the World Cup, What’s more, they have also planned an attack on India. He has given a message to the entire Sikh community that do not travel by Air India flight on 19th November, something big is going to happen. He does not even shy away from threatening the Hindu people settled in Canada. Threat is one thing, but the most shocking thing is that Canada does not want to take any action on this in the name of freedom of speech. We consider Canada to be a peace-loving country, a developed country, where supposedly people’s lives should be valued. A country that welcomes immigrants with open hearts. But the truth is something else that will be revealed to you today which will reveal a dirty secret of Canada. Let dip dive into it
The Canada And Khalistan Connection
People consider 9/11 as the world’s worst terror attack, after which America did not remain silent. They first attacked Afghanistan and then Iraq, and finally, killed Osama bin Laden in 2011. When Israeli people were attacked, Israel did not remain silent. Ukraine did not remain silent when Ukraine was attacked. India did not remain silent when India was attacked. That means when your people are attacked, you take some action. That action may not be as extreme as starting a war, but you take some action. But before 9/11, Canadian citizens were attacked. Air India flight Kanishka, which was coming from Toronto to Delhi, was bombed near Ireland. All 329 people sitting on the flight were killed. This was the world’s most dangerous aviation terror attack before 9/11 and the two parties responsible for this were Khalistani terrorists and Canada. How come Canada? Let us understand.
The Khalistan Movement started in 1971. Jagjit Singh Chauhan published a report in the New York Times that a new country, Khalistan, is being created for the Sikhs, and he himself is its President. He started collecting donations for this cause. He issued passports to Khalistani people and also opened consular. India’s intelligence agencies believed that Pakistan had a hand in this. There is a deep connection between Khalistan and Pakistan.
Is There Any Connection Between Khalistan And Pakistan ?
1971 was an important year for both India and Pakistan. Due to the Bangladesh Liberation War, a large part of Pakistan broke away from Pakistan and became Bangladesh, and 93,000 soldiers of Pakistan surrendered before India. After this defeat, Pakistan adopted the strategy of “Bleed India by a Thousand Cuts“. Pakistan understood that it could not face India’s military in a conventional combat. So it adopted different methods. The Khalistan Movement is also a part of this strategy. CIA documents say that Punjab is like a strategic buffer for India. Separating Punjab from India is like taking revenge for Bangladesh. I have not said this, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the former Prime Minister of Pakistan said this. If Khalistan had not been supported by Pakistan, then Punjab from the Pakistan side would have been included in the map of Khalistan because Guru Nanak Ji was born there. But today’s Khalistanis do not want to break Pakistan, they only want this part of India.
After Jagjit Singh and Bhindranwale, the torch of the Khalistan Movement passed into the hands of Talwinder Singh Parmar. Operation Blue Star took place in 1984, after which our PM Indira Gandhi was killed by her own bodyguards. Anti-Sikh riots took place which pushed many Sikh people away from India both physically and emotionally. Parmar used this anger to revive the Khalistan movement outside India, and Canada knew this. Talwinder Singh Parmar was making inflammatory speeches in Canada. He threatened to kill 50,000 Hindus. At the same time, the Indian High Commissions were also attacked. Canadian Intelligence itself was keeping an eye on him. The Canadian Intelligence report says that Parmar was instigating people and giving terror threats. These threats were being made from Canadian soil against people of Indian origin based in Canada. And most importantly, Canada was also aware of it, that is, they were tracking it, but they did not take any action. What was the impact of this inaction? Let us understand.
How Canada Responsible For Air India Bombings
Sikh people settled in Canada tried to warn the Canadian government that Parmar’s threats were not just threats, they had to be taken seriously. Even some Khalistani supporters gave repeated warnings to the Canadian Secret Service, CSIS. Forget about India, Gerry Boudreault was a French-Canadian criminal who used to commit petty crimes. Parmar offered him $200,000 to plant a bomb on an Air India flight. This was in 1984 when a criminal showed the wisdom to go to the police and warn them. But, why would the words of a criminal and the lives of Indians matter to the Canadian Police? 3 weeks before the bombing, when Indian Intelligence informed the Air India security officer about the bomb plans, they started panicking. This telegram was also given to the RCMP(Royal Canadian Mounted Police). So government, police, intelligence, and even airport officials knew that something major was going to happen. On top of that, Canadian Intelligence was following Talwinder Singh Parmar. 3 weeks before the bombing, Parmar went to Inderjit Reyat’s place. Reyat was the in charge of making the bomb. When Parmar reached there, Reyat also tested a bomb, which means the Intelligence Service was witnessing all this. Just 2 weeks before the bombing, Talwinder Singh Parmar and his associates started spreading the message at Malton Gurudwara in Toronto that don’t take Air India flights, Air India flights are dangerous. That is, the Sikh community had given a warning, a criminal had given a warning, Air India had sent a telegram, CSIS had also seen that they were testing a bomb, even Parmar himself had announced that something major was going to happen, that too specifically in an Air India flight. Yet Canada did not take action, and what was feared, happened.
The first bomb exploded in Tokyo Narita Airport, but due to miscalculation by the Khalistani people, the bomb exploded on the luggage belt, not in the plane, and two luggage handlers were killed and 4 were injured. Exactly 55 minutes after the Tokyo bomb blast, Air India Flight 182 vanished from the radar. Air traffic controllers started panicking. They had lost contact with the pilot. Nearby planes started searching for the Air India flight, but the flight had already crashed 190 kilometers away from the coast of Ireland. There was a deadly bomb blast on the flight, and all 329 people on board the flight were killed. Of these, 24 were Indian citizens, 27 were British citizens, and 268 were Canadian citizens. The most tragic thing is that only 131 of these bodies were recovered. The Royal British Air Force and Irish Sailors went to rescue the passengers of the Air India flight, but they could not save anyone. This was the biggest tragedy in the history of Canada, the history of Air India, and the history of world aviation before 9/11. And you know the worst part, these were all preventable tragedies. Canadian officials are as much responsible for this attack as Khalistani terrorists, as it was only because of their negligence that this attack could be carried out.
How Canada Failed the World
After this whole incident, you would think that Canada would be very angry, right? Because if you see citizenship-wise, Canadians died the most. Just like America reacted after 9/11, Canada must have taken some action against Khalistani supporters, the Khalistan movement would have been destroyed from Canadian soil, but actually, the opposite happened. Canada considered it an Indian disaster. because by citizenship they were Canadian, but their skin colour was not white, they were of Indian origin. Whatever happened after the bombing, Canada handled it shamefully. Canada repeatedly tried to lie that it had no knowledge of this attack. But the truth is that when the Air India bombings happened, the Canadian intelligence officer who was keeping an eye on Parmar said, He did it, I can’t believe Parmar did it! Lying is one thing, but Canada also tried to hide evidence. From March 1985 to June 1985, Canadian Intelligence tapped the phones of Talwinder Singh Parmar. They had 210 recordings in which Parmar must have obviously discussed many things. The phone conversations of the person under suspicion can be a huge source of evidence in a trial. But for some weird reason, 156 out of 210 recordings were deleted and their transcripts were not even made. Even immediately after the bombing, Parmar’s phone was tapped, but all the evidence was systematically erased so that the Khalistan movement and the Canadian government’s vote bank remained intact.
Obviously, without any evidence, the defence lawyers were able to free Parmar and his associates. Even those who lost their families in these bombings did not receive any support from the Canadian government. By the time the trial of this case started, 15 years had passed. The trial of this bombing finally started in the year 2000. But still, many witnesses refused to give their testimony. They were intimidated and threatened. Tara Singh Hayer was a newspaper editor who was going to testify against the bomb plot in court, but he was killed 2 years earlier in 1998. Till today no one knows who killed him. Japan helped in the investigation, which is why the person who made the bomb was arrested. But Canada ultimately released him too in 2017. Today he lives a normal life in Canada. There is no capital punishment in Canada, and Canada does not consider this terrorist attack as its own, nor does it consider the people who died as its own. How would you have felt if India had released Ajmal Kasab?
Due to a lack of evidence, two of his associates were not even punished. This was the most expensive investigation in the history of Canada, which took 217 days and 60 million dollars were spent, but no one got justice. To hide the mistakes of Khalistani terrorists, Canada allowed its police, its secret service, its judiciary, everyone, to get corrupted and ignored their mistakes. This story of investigation got a full stop when in 2010, Supreme Court Justice John Major strongly criticized Canada. He said, it was a preventable tragedy, no action was taken even after the proof was there, recordings were deleted, and the culprits were let off without punishment. After this report came, Canada officially apologized for this incident in 2010. But is forgiveness enough? Can one apology cover so many incompetencies? Is this a joke?
Terry Milewski, who wrote a book on Khalistan, says that Pannu has dual citizenship, in both Canada and USA, yet neither Canada nor the USA said anything about their views. If there was any other country in place of Canada that considered itself a friend of India, then perhaps it would take some action, and take these warning signs seriously. They would have helped us in catching those whom we call terrorists, against whom many criminal cases have been registered. But Canada thinks it is right to blame India for their problems.
Conclusion
This was 40 years ago, right, so why does it matter to us today? It does because Canada has forgotten its history, and is still making the same mistakes that have cost lives. Canada says that the Khalistan movement is under control. Today Justin Trudeau is their PM. His father was the PM at the time of the Air India Bombings in 1985. Today a Khalistani terrorist from Canada is giving threats of bombings, wants to drive away Indians from Canada, and Canada is trying to suppress it under freedom of speech. I didn’t know that threats came under freedom of speech. Even if something happens in the future, some Canadian Prime Minister will apologize after 50 years. Canada’s template is already ready.
this story of Kanishka flight is a reminder for all of us that the people of Canada do not consider this tragedy as their tragedy, do not consider brown-skinned people as their people, no matter what the citizenship papers say. Canada does see its failures as its failures, it does not cooperate with India, and it not only hides the evidence but also deletes it for vote bank politics. And even their own Supreme Court Justice says this. And our students go to such countries with our money, with the hope that maybe after 10 years
they will get citizenship, and their life will be set.
Why has Canada become a safe base for Khalistanis today? How is Indira Gandhi’s assassination celebrated on Canadian soil and no action is taken against the culprits? In Canada, where there is such a large Indian community, how can a terrorist who killed more than 300 people roam freely? And what message does this incident give to Khalistani terrorists? Do whatever you want, plan terror attacks, and even execute them, the trial will continue for 20 years, and even after that, if you are found guilty, you will not be hanged, you will be released back into society someday. To put things in perspective, Ajmal Kasab killed 72 people and India thought it right to give him capital punishment. And Inderjit Singh Reyat has killed 331 people, who roams in Canada as a free citizen.
Canada is harmful not only for Canadians but also for the all the outsider living there. Because it is important for the whole world to know this dirty secret of Canada. It is important for our new generation to know this so that we can understand the context of today’s geo-politics, those whom we make our heroes, the country we idolize, see the real face of it.
