The Trudeau government is at the receiving end of backlash and plenty of embarrassment after it launched a fresh attack on the Indian government and diplomats accusing them of involvement in criminal activities against Khalistani terrorists in Canada without a shred of evidence.
While the diplomatic tensions between India and Canada have heightened since PM Trudeau first accused the Indian government of involvement in Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar’s killing, the Trudeau government has desperately been trying to convince its public that India is bad. Trudeau government has been implying that Indian media and social media handles ‘interfering’, ‘manipulating’ information in the context of Trudeau’s initial statement regarding India’s imaginary role in Nijjar’s murder.
On the 12th of September this year, the Canadian government’s Foreign Interference Commission released a report prepared as part of the Global Affairs Department’s Rapid Response Mechanism. This report titled Potential Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference following PM Statement on Killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar alleged that there is pro-Modi section of Indian media, which amplified ‘propaganda’ and spread ‘disinformation’ regarding the killing of Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar. In June 2023, and the later statement issued by PM Trudeau in September last year accused Indian government of involvement in Nijjar’s murder.
The Canadian government labelled several Indian media outlets and social media influencers as ‘Godi Media’ alleging that they targeted PM Trudeau, Canadian High Commissioner in India, and the Canadian Sikh community. These baseless assertions made in the report itself expose the sheer bias of the Canadian government. Indian social media users criticising the Trudeau government and Canadian diplomats over the baseless allegations against India and PM Modi does not amount to disinformation. Indian influencers, particularly the ones listed in the RRM report indeed ‘targeted’ Hardeep Singh Nijjar’s ‘political beliefs’ since his beliefs directly challenged the territorial integrity of India.
One of the ‘key findings’ of the report was that influencers/commentators employed by ‘Modi-aligned’ media outlets accused Justin Trudeau of being an “enabler of terrorism”, “falling into the laps of Khalistani extremists,” or “treacherous against Bharat (India).” The only question that arises here is where is the lie? Has Canada not become a safe haven for Khalistani terrorists, are Khalistani terrorists not using Canadian soil to peddle their separatist agenda, conduct farcical referendums, deface Hindu temples, carry out frequent protests disparaging India, Hindus, the Indian Prime Minister and diplomats? When the Trudeau government is giving a free pass to Khalistani terrorists to carry out anti-India and anti-Hindu activities in Canada, what will Indians call him, “annihilator of Khalistanis”?
The report further lamented that the Indian media outlets enjoy “fourteen times” the following than major Canadian outlets including CTV and CBC News. Apparently, RRM Canada suggested that since Indian media has a wider reach online than Canadian media, the global audiences were exposed to “Modi-aligned” narratives. This is such a juvenile argument, since the Canadian people, except the Khalistanis, have consistently been criticising the Trudeau government for making outrageous allegations against the Indian government but not providing a single piece of evidence. In fact, Canadians were joined by Indians in mocking Trudeau over him asking Indian authorities to provide them with ‘evidence’ of their supposed involvement in Nijjar’s assassination.
Listing down the so-called ‘Modi-aligned’ narratives observed by the Canadian authorities, the report said that threats and accusations were levelled against Canadian diplomats in India. Moreover, another ‘narrative’ [read fact] that the report mentions is that Canada safeguards terrorists and extremist forces.
“Several Modi-aligned influencers claimed Canada has historically sheltered terrorist elements of the Khalistan movement. In one high-engagement post (29.5K engagements, 419K user views), frequent Times Now and CNN-Newsl8 commentator Anand Ranganthan claims former PM Pierre Trudeau allowed the 1985 Air India bombing suspected to “walk free,” and that “the apple never falls far from the tree,” suggesting PM Justin Trudeau has familial reasons for safeguarding Khalistan supporters,” the report stated.
The Foreign Interference Commission report, however, did not provide any counter to the ‘narrative’ it deemed misleading or ‘Modi-aligned’. From Khalistan terrorists like Hardeep Singh Nijjar, whose Canadian citizenship remains questionable to this day, to Islamic terrorist Ahmed Ressam to Nazi war criminals, Canada has been a safe haven for all of them. In fact, Mikhailo Chomiak, the grandfather of the current Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland himself was a Nazi collaborator.
Furthermore, the report also attempted to negate Nijjar’s role as a Khalistani terrorist saying that the Indian media reports and social media posts aimed to ‘discredit’ Nijjar’s role as a ‘community leader’ in Surrey. Notably, OpIndia has reported earlier, how Nijjar not only ran a terror camp in Canada and was in contact with Khalistani terrorists but also visited Pakistan. Over the years, the Canadian government protected a designated terrorist, and the Canadian PM destroyed ties with India for him just to win political support from the Khalistanis, but Indian media and influencers talking about it amounts to ‘manipulation’ and ‘disinformation’.
The report also pointed out that several social media handles and Indian journalists including News18’s Amish Devgan shared a picture of Trudeau with regime change specialist George Soros to imply that somehow the Canadian PM has ties with Soros. While there may or may not be a direct link between Trudeau and Soros, the latter’s hatred for Prime Minister Modi and the BJP government is widely known. Such speculative social media posts do not amount to disinformation even if they may have rattled PM Trudeau.
In addition to several other points, the report listed several Indian journalists, social media handles of Indian news outlets including ANI, Zee News etc, and their reach as well as some posts critical of PM Trudeau in the context of his statement regarding Nijjar’s killing and the anti-India rant.
Notably, this report was published only weeks before Justin Trudeau launched his fresh attack against Indian diplomats and the Modi government, accusing them of being ‘persons of interest’ and being involved in criminal activities against Canadian citizens [read Khalistanis]. India rejected the allegations and called them “preposterous imputations” and part of the Trudeau government’s political agenda.
India recalled its High Commissioner to Canada following which the Trudeau government asked 6 Indian diplomats to leave the country. In a reciprocal move, New Delhi expelled 6 Canadian Canadian diplomats, asking them to leave the country before 20th October.
In an accidental moment of truth, Trudeau recently admitted that they had no evidence before accusing the Indian government of involvement in the killing of Khalistani extremist Hardeep Singh Nijjar. In an interview, Trudeau said that they had no proof to pinpoint the killing of Nijjar to India when they had first accused New Delhi of orchestrating the assassination on Canadian soil.
“They(India) asked us to share the evidence and at that point, it was weak intelligence and not hard evidence,” said Trudeau, confirming that allegations of Indian involvement in Nijjar’s killing were not backed with proof.
While the Canadian government and its dubious reports suggest that the Trudeau government does not pander to Khalistani elements, designated Khalistani terrorist and SFJ chief Gurpatwant Singh Pannun admitted to being in contact with Justin Trudeau’s office for the last three years and having shared information with them.
The desperation to deflect the attention of the Canadian people from allegations of Chinese interference in the last two federal elections in Canada as well as to appease the Khalistani votebank, particularly since Trudeau has grown highly unpopular among the public for a plethora of reasons, has reduced PM Trudeau and his government into clowns making a mockery of themselves at a global level.
While RRM Canada has been worrying about Canadians coming across the so-called “Modi-aligned narratives” from Indian sources like Canada safeguarding extremists and terrorists, Hardeep Nijjar being an unsavoury individual and a member of Khalistan Tiger Force and Babbar Khalsa, Pakistan funding Khalistanis in Canada among others, most of these have been proven to be true. So, is the Trudeau government afraid that the Canadian people will learn the truth?
When the Trudeau government calls a Khalistani terrorist like Nijjar, who fraudulently stayed in Canada, and indulged in anti-India activities a “community leader”, strains bilateral ties with India over baseless claims to consolidate anti-India votebank only to admit it eventually that there was no evidence against India, the Canadian government is left with no option but to blame Indian media, Indian social media users for not falling for the theatrics of PM Trudeau.
