This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Tim Stenebeck on Bloomberg Radio.
Ari Alstedter he is Canada real estate reporter at Bloomberg News and he joins us from our Toronto bureau. Ari, you know, it's funny, not funny. We've been talking about this story a lot in the newsroom because it really seems to potentially have some significant consequences for how we look at India geopolitically and just a lot of other
serious issues. But again, relaid it out briefly, but tell us about, you know, maybe even the conversations you had with Jill Webber, the editor of the magazine, about why we had to do something on this story.
Right. Well, like you said earlier in the program, I think for an international audience outside of Canada, this really has been flying under the radar. But that really under sells how important it is, because, as you say, India was really looked to, or has been being looked to by, you know, Western democratic countries as a potential democratic counterweight to the rising power of China, a billion person country that is in Asia that Western democracies could look to
to sort of represent their values in the region. And champion those values in the region. The problem with that for the last few years is that even as Western countries like the US, France, the UK and Canada have been trying to cultivate India as a friend, the government of Prime Minisner under Modi has taken a liberal turn
back home. Opposition politicians, journalists, minority communities have said that mister Modi and his nationalists Hindu nationalist DJP government has cultivated a klim where speaking out speaking against the government line is a risky thing and could incur legal penalties, harassment, all sorts of unpleasantness from the state to try to
induce people not to do this. Now. Expediencies sort of allowed or demanded that these western countries turn a blind eye to this for as long as it was happening in India. But the murder of a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil is something Priminis gusture so couldn't look away from. And that puts his allies in the US and the UK and France and the other countries in an awkward situation too, because on the one hand, you know, killing
each other's citizens is really an unspoken rule. There's really an unspoken taboo against this among all these Western countries, India violated this. So what do you do with that as you want to continue to cultivate India as a friend.
So that's a really good, really good context for the background and the backdrop of this assassination earlier this year, back in June. Let's go back to who Hardeep sing Najar is or.
Was, well right, He was a Canadian citizen. He owned a plumbing business in Surrey, British Columbia. He had a wife and two adult sons. He was also president of his gurdwara, which is the Sikh temple. But most relevant is he was a vocal supporter of as you say, Khalistan,
this movement to establish a Sikh homeland and Punjab. And most important, he was one of the leaders of this activist effort to stage unofficial referendums in the Sikh diaspora around the world on Kalistan, putting votes to people who are part of the Sikh community. Do you believe there should be an independent Seak homeland, an independent Punjab, yes
or no? These these votes. The group that put these on that that mister Niner was a part of, seeks for Justice have staged these votes in sea communities around the world, including the UK, Austria, Australia, Switzerland, others. And actually, in April of this year, mister Niner got up during a Sikh festival in front of his gurdwara and said that the referendum would now be coming a British Columbia. A few months later, he was killed.
And a you know what, I oh, I'm sorry, please go ahead.
Well what I thought was just going to yeah, please, my apologies. Well, what I thought was.
Interesting what you said at the at the beginning. I'm going to go I'm going to go for a second, just because because what I think was interesting. No, but because we really have been talking about this in the newsroom, because it has gotten buried among so many other headlines. And I think about what you said at the beginning. India has been looked at as a democratic counterweight to
the rise of China. You know, we're living in an error where geopolitics and I feel like geopolitical relationships are being you know, rethought or you know, and we're we're definitely seeing increased pushback against China. And so what I'm wondering is, as you did, this story and looked at what happened.
To him.
You know, what are you finding out about what's going on in the Indian government? Because Prime Minister Modi has said the allegations against him in connection with this or his government absurd, right, and he calls certain individuals terrorists. But what have you been finding out your reporting? As again we increasingly look to India as maybe that's the partner of the next big partner for the world.
What have you found out, well, our colleagues in India, have you know, looked into what the reaction to this story has been in the country, and interestingly it's produced
a kind of rally around the flag effect. Right wing media is very powerful in India and many of the media, in part out of this sort of broader climate that pre Minister Modi and the BJP have cultivated, many media have fronted more right wing voices in their coverage, and these kind of commentators have been very much denouncing Canada, proclaiming Hardep signature as a terrorist and saying that the killing was justified, pointing to the US saying the US
conducts drone strikes on people it considers terrorists in other countries. Why shouldn't India be able to do the same. India labeled Hardeep signature as a terrorist and said that he was involved in a plot to kill a Hindu priest in Punjab. It earlier accused him of having of leading Sikh activists or seeks into terrorist training camps in British Columbia. The thing is, by their own admission, the Indian government, from our sources, from our discussions with them, brought that
latter terrorist training camp allegation to Canadian police. Canadian police checked it out and determined that they were just going to a show range outside of Surrey. The community where they were going. The mayor, when he got wind of this, spoke out and said it was absurd that there was a training camp nearby, any kind of terrorist training camp nearby. So the issue with a lot of the allegations community
the Indian government seems to be proof. And also that if there was proof, and if there was strong evidence, there is an extradition process. Charges can be brought in India and you can apply for extradition. Canada is a place where there is rule of law, unlike the places where the US has conducted his drone strikes. Yemen, Somalia very hard to extra write someone out of Yemen. For Canada, it's not such a big problem if it meets the
standards of evidence for Canadian law. The Indians seem to don't make much of this argument, which is essentially what the Canadian government has been saying and deem or accuse the Canadians of ignoring their complaints about the activities of people like Heartyep signature and just not doing anything about it. And so our sources and the government say that that prompted them to take matters into their own hands, or at least decide that Nigure was a problem that had to be addressed.
Well, what do we know about the actual crime that occurred, the assassination here who? What do we know about who exactly was behind it and how are people being held accountable?
Well, we don't know who's behind it. What we have is the Canadian allegations or the allegation by the Canadian government that India, the government of India, was behind it. We do know details of the crime itself as it occurred. We know that it was a Sunday evening in Surrey Father's Day in June. Hardep sing Jar at around eight pm, was leaving the Gurdwara after a day of working there as the president giving his Sunday speech and the like. He was driving out sort of the back exit of
the Gridwara parking lot. As he was driving Goodwara security cameras capture a serious white sedan seemed to start moving as soon as he did, pulled in front of him on the road out and then stopped right before the exit of the Gridwara merged into a larger road when that car stopped at forced hardiep Sing the Jersey stop and then two people in black, two men in black emerged from the south of the road and fired into the driver's seat window of Niger's truck. The firing continued
for around five seconds, maybe a bit longer. As soon as the firing started that that white car pulled out of the out of the gridir and drove away. And then the two gunmen stopped firing and they started running. Witnesses saw them running, and witnesses who I spoke to three people pursued them, followed them into a park nearby. One says that one of the gunmen they were justsed
all in black. They had black hoodies on, and they appeared to be concealing holding something in their pockets in the front hoodie pocket and one of the gunmen pulled a gun out and threatened one of the pursuers, then proceeded deeper into the park. The pursuers, after hesitating twenty seconds or so, continued and caught up just in time to see the two gunmen, still masked, get into a silver sedan that was parked in a cul de sac right at the end of the park and then drive away.
And so that's what we know. The police have released a lot of disinformation. The white sedan is still a mystery. The police identified the silver car as a two thousand and eight Toyota Corolla and asked for information of that identifying the other the driver that as another suspect. And that's pretty much where it starts.
Yeah, unfortunately we have to run. There is so much rich detail in this story, and it reminds me of the complicated relationship that the world has had which Jane over the last twenty thirty years. And now you wonder if it's just a repeat with India. Ari Alstetter, thank you so much.