India denies minister plotted anti-Sikh attacks in Canada

NEW DELHI: India on Saturday denied home minister Amit Shah had plotted to target Sikh activists on Canadian soil and said it had officially rebuked Ottawa over the “absurd and baseless” allegation.

Canada is home to the largest Sikh community outside of India, and includes activists for “Khalistan”, a fringe separatist movement seeking an independent state for the religious minority carved out of Indian territory.

Canadian officials said this week that Ottawa had traced a campaign targeting Canadian Khalistan activists to the highest levels of India’s government and implicated Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s powerful right-hand man.

“The Government of India protests in the strongest terms to the absurd and baseless references made to the Union Home Minister of India,” foreign ministry spokesman Randhir Jaiswal told reporters.

“We had summoned the representative of the Canadian High Commission yesterday. A diplomatic note was handed over,” he added. Jaiswal accused Canadian officials of deliberately leaking “unfounded insinuations” to the media to “discredit India”. “Such irresponsible actions will have serious consequences for bilateral ties,” he said.