Australia should take notes on the India–Canada fallout

Author: Dron Parashar, Canberra

In September 2023, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau alleged in front of the Canadian Parliament that India was involved in the killing of Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar. These allegations have come at a time when Australia, along with its Western partners, is actively courting India to create a counterbalance against China.

India was quick to deny Trudeau’s accusations, calling them ‘absurd and motivated’. This is a new low for relations between the two countries that have had constant disagreements over the handling of the Khalistan movement since the 1985 Kanishka bombing. The breakdown is a jarring development for the West.

Unsurprisingly, Australia’s response to the controversy has been cautious. The intent to strengthen economic and security ties between Australia and India has never been clearer. The excitement in this partnership is such that Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese even called Indian Prime Minister Modi ‘boss’ in front of 20,000 members of the Indian diaspora at the Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney.

Australia should navigate the political climate with an awareness of both India’s security concerns and those of the West — to which it belongs. To start, the Australian government should not mistakenly link the rise in crimes against minorities in India to calls for establishing Khalistan, an independent Sikh state from India. To do so would be falling into an ethno-nationalist narrative that pro-Khalistan separatists wish to promote to gain sympathisers.

While many continue to seek justice for the crimes committed during the anti-Sikh riots of 1984 and the years that followed, the demand for a separate state has little to no support from Sikhs back in India. This is due to the strides the Sikh community has made in all avenues of public and private life in India.

Sikhs on average are the wealthiest by a wide margin compared to India’s other three major religious groups. The study also found that despite recent instances of privileging Hindu nationalists over other minorities, a vast majority of Indian religious minorities including Sikhs remain proud to be Indian. But pro-Khalistan groups based outside of India are attempting to use these instances as fodder to enrich the discourse around a separate Sikh state.

In an independent review, Colin Bloom, a former faith engagement advisor to the UK government noted, only ‘a small, extremely vocal and aggressive minority of British Sikhs […] can be described as pro-Khalistan extremists’. This holds true for the pro-Khalistan separatist movements in Australia, Canada and the United States. The report adds that ‘while these extremists reflect a tiny minority, they attract disproportionate amounts of attention and stoke divisive sentiments in sectors of Sikh communities’.

During Modi’s visit to Australia in May, Modi raised the latest outbreaks of violence in Australia involving pro-Khalistan separatists with Albanese. Modi said that India ‘will not accept any elements that harm the friendly and warm ties between India and Australia by their actions or thoughts’. The events in Canada are a stark reminder that the Modi administration is likely to put the Khalistan issue at the centre of all bilateral discussions.

Though a strict stance against the secessionist movement strongly favours Modi’s popularity back home, the pro-Khalistan extremism emanating internationally has been a security concern for India for decades. It is only now — due to its growing economic and geopolitical clout — that India can respond indignantly against the Canadian administration.

Any violent makeover of the Khalistan movement is likely to become an irritant between Australia and India that could derail much bilateral progress and seriously handicap Australia’s Indo-Pacific strategy. Unlike its partners in the West, Australia is located in the Indo-Pacific region. Its security and economic needs are more pressing when it comes to navigating relations with India and China and so require careful treading between the two.

On the other hand, this situation presents an opportunity to lay down clear prerequisites for both Quad members before their partnership deepens. Australia must be unequivocal in its support for the democratic right of every Australian citizen to engage in peaceful protests and that any reduction of this will not be tolerated. At the same time, Australia must reassure Indian authorities that any legitimate security concerns will be taken seriously.

The Australian government should be able to do what Canadian authorities have failed to do in the past and recognise attempts by pro-Khalistan lobbying groups who artificially inflate their influence by using the ‘Sikh’ label. Blending diaspora politics with domestic politics is a dangerous game and one that Australian political parties must avoid. Viewing the Nijjar controversy as evidence of an ethnic divide between the Hindus and Sikhs is a threat to the security of the majority of well-meaning Australian Sikhs that are unorganised or uninterested in pushing back against the pro-Khalistan agenda of an organised few.

The Khalistan movement in Australia is still in its infancy and Australia is in a better position than Canada to appreciate the complexities of the movement before it infiltrates the politics and influences decision-making.

The diplomatic row between India and Canada serves as a blueprint for when past grievances from afar are nurtured and are left to spill over into federal politics. The vexed response from the Indian government to Trudeau’s allegations reflects India’s rising global clout. While Australia needs to be strict about any Indian intimidation towards the pro-Khalistan separatists in Australia, Canberra should work with New Delhi to reign in extremist ideology and organised crime before it leaks into the future and undoes hard bilateral work.

Dron Parashar is a Political Risk Analyst and a former advisor to an Australian Federal Member of Parliament.

 

 

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