NEW DELHI - India on Wednesday urged its nationals in Canada, and Indians planning to visit the country, to exercise caution as relations deteriorated after each nation expelled one of the other’s diplomats in an escalating row over the murder of a Sikh separatist leader.

Tension has grown since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Monday that Canada was investigating “credible allegations” about the potential involvement of Indian government agents in the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia in June.

An activist for the creation of Khalistan, Mr Nijjar was wanted by the Indian authorities for alleged terrorism and conspiracy to commit murder – charges he had denied.

“In view of growing anti-India activities and politically condoned hate crimes and criminal violence in Canada, all Indian nationals there, and those contemplating travel, are urged to exercise utmost caution,” India’s foreign ministry said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has rejected outright Canada’s suspicions that New Delhi’s agents had links to the murder.

“Given the deteriorating security environment in Canada, Indian students in particular are advised to exercise extreme caution and remain vigilant,” the ministry added in a statement.

India has been the largest source nation for international students in Canada since 2018. That figure rose 47 per cent last year to nearly 320,000, making up about 40 per cent of total overseas students, says the Canadian Bureau for International Education, which also helps institutions provide a subsidised education to domestic students.

On Wednesday, a private entertainment company, BookMyShow, announced the cancellation of an India tour by Canadian singer Shubhneet Singh.

India’s main opposition Congress party backed the government’s rejection of the accusations, urging taking a stand against threats to the country’s sovereignty.

“Trudeau’s defence of declared terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar is absolutely shameful and shows how much the present Canadian regime is in bed with Khalistani sympathisers,” Mr Abhishek Manu Singhvi, a senior Congress lawmaker, posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Khalistan is the name of an independent Sikh state whose creation was the goal of a bloody Sikh insurgency in the 1980s and 1990s in India’s northern state of Punjab, during which tens of thousands were killed. As the ruling party at the time, Congress led the fight against the separatists and eventually suppressed the insurgency.

But it took the lives of key Congress leaders: Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards in 1984, and Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh, who was killed in a bomb blast by Sikh separatists in 1995.

Although there is hardly any support for the insurgency left in India, small groups of Sikhs in Australia, Britain, Canada and the United States support the separatist demand and occasionally stage protests outside its embassies.

New Delhi, which remains wary of any revival of the insurgency, has long been unhappy over Sikh separatist activity in Canada and urged it to act against anti-Indian elements.

A former chief of India’s external spy agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, said it was strange Mr Trudeau had announced the expulsion of an Indian diplomat in Parliament.

“We don’t do these things,” the Economic Times newspaper quoted A.S. Dulat as telling the Press Trust of India news agency. “We do not go around assassinating people, let me make this very clear.”

Canada has the largest population of Sikhs outside the Indian state of Punjab, with about 770,000 people reporting Sikhism as their religion in the 2021 census.

Meanwhile, Canada’s Sikh community is hoping Ottawa’s accusations against India will be just the first dramatic step taken against alleged “Indian interference”.

“We are happy to see India being held accountable,” said Mr Harkirt Singh Dhadda, a lawyer and prominent member of the Sikh community in the Toronto area.

“We want a full investigation that brings to justice the people involved in this assassination, including those who pulled the trigger and the ones who plotted this assassination,” he said.

Mr Nijjar’s son described a “sense of relief” that the accusations were finally out in the open.

“Hopefully, you can take this a step further and get specific individuals,” Mr Balraj Singh Nijjar told reporters.

In front of the Sikh temple in Surrey, yellow flags proclaiming Khalistan were flying. Anger in the community has not subsided.

“The fact that a political assassination of this nature could occur in broad daylight in Surrey gives rise to grave concerns about the Government of Canada’s lack of decisive action in combating Indian foreign interference in Canada,” the British Columbia Gurdwaras Council said in a statement.

Mr Jagmeet Singh, the leader of the left-wing New Democratic Party (NDP) and a Trudeau ally, called for India to be included in a public inquiry launched earlier in September into alleged foreign interference, particularly by China.

“In my experience, as a Sikh-Canadian, there have always been suspicions that India was interfering in the democratic rights of Canadians. Yesterday’s announcement confirms that these suspicions are valid,” he said.

Canada must also put an end to intelligence sharing with New Delhi, say Sikh officials.

Since 2018, the two countries have established cooperation on counter-terrorism activities which commits them to financial, judicial and police cooperation – an agreement eyed warily by Canadian Sikhs today. AFP