A Mississauga, Ont., man says he was detained at the Amritsar, India, airport on New Year’s Eve without food or medical assistance for 36 hours before Indian officials ejected him from the country.
Gurcharan Singh Banwait, 77, a Canadian citizen for nearly 50 years, says he frequently travels to India for his healthcare charity International Punjabi Foundation, and he’s never had an issue until his most recent trip.
“It was painful,” Banwait told CBC Toronto. “They put me in a room there, they locked it and put two security guards with guns.”
Banwait, who underwent heart surgery recently and has a spinal disc herniation, said he was not given a place to lie down and the cold weather made his back pain worse. He also alleges he was not allowed to go to the washroom unassisted, and that an Indian officer called him a “Khalistani,” a term used for supporters of Khalistan, a Sikh separatist movement.
“I was feeling embarrassed, insulted,” he said.
Those closely following the disintegration of Canada-India relations over the last few years say this is an example of an increasing trend of India harassing and blacklisting Sikhs and journalists, sparking concerns the country is using visas as a tool for foreign interference.
The Mississauga man says he’s speaking out because he worries that other Sikh Canadians may be similarly detained or blacklisted but not know until after they’ve bought an expensive ticket, travelled for more than 14 hours around the globe and been potentially held in custody.
“Nobody listens to you. They’ll put you in jail and you’re gone,” Banwait said.
CBC Toronto sent multiple requests to the Indian consulate and High Commission in Canada, as well as India’s Ministry of External Affairs. The Indian High Commission refused to comment over a phone call, while officials in New Delhi did not respond.
Global Affairs Canada is aware of the situation but cannot intervene in immigration matters on behalf of Canadians, a spokesperson said in an emailed statement.
“Every country or territory decides who can enter or exit through its borders,” the statement says.
India monitoring diaspora ‘with full force’: lawyer
For decades, India has used its central adverse list — more commonly known as a blacklist — to mark a person as inadmissible to the country.
The number of Canadians on the blacklist has been growing since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused the Indian government of playing a role in the killing of Canadian Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in 2023, according to Balpreet Singh, legal counsel and spokesperson for World Sikh Organization Canada.
A December investigation by Global News revealed agents of Indian proxies asked Sikh Canadians to sign affidavits professing their “deep respect” for India in order to get a visa.
Indian diplomats and consular officials have used their discretion to grant or withhold visas to pressure people to conduct surveillance or become informants, sources told CBC News last year.
“India using visas to manipulate people is foreign interference,” Singh said. “Getting people here in Canada to do or not do certain things in order to get visas is just wrong.”
“It’s a practice that really needs to end.”
The Indian government has increasingly targeted individuals criticizing government policies or for association with movements like Khalistan, according to Raman Sohi, an immigration lawyer in Vancouver.
“The Indian government has resources, they have means to monitor people outside India. They’re using those means with full force,” Sohi said.
India does not notify blacklisted individuals and often does not provide them with a reason, Sohi said.
“They can deny you entry straight away,” he said. “They can detain you … they can actually start prosecuting you there.”
Sohi says the Hindu nationalist ruling party under Prime Minister Narendra Modi is “trying to silence critics” and he doesn’t expect the problem will get any better.
“They’re very aggressive,” he said.
As for Banwait, he is unsure if his Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) card which allows a holder multi-purpose, multiple entry, lifelong visa, is valid or not.
He acknowledges his deportation could have been for his 1986 arrest for allegations related to a plot to bomb a flight, but says that is unlikely since he was acquitted and has travelled to India with no issues in the decades since then.
He suspects it was his attendance at a December event in Punjab about the history of the Sikh empire.
“Day and night I’m thinking: what did I do wrong? I didn’t do anything,” he said.
He says he stays up thinking whether he is permanently barred from entering his homeland and if so, what that would mean for his hospital, properties and charity in India, and his family members who want to visit.
Blacklisted American journalist takes Indian government to court
Angad Singh, an American freelance journalist and producer, is on the blacklist.
He fought in court to find out why his OCI was cancelled and he was sent back to New York from Delhi in 2022.
According to the court documents, it was Singh’s work as an assistant producer on VICE’s award-winning documentary, “India Burning,” which was about India’s new anti-Muslim citizenship laws.
The Indian government sees the story as “anti national propaganda to defame the country,” according to court documents.
“What we’re seeing is it’s [visas] being weaponized against certain parts of the broader Indian diaspora, against certain minority groups, against those that might try to speak truth to power,” Singh said.
Singh continues his legal battle against the government’s decision in a Delhi high court.
