India-Canada ties under Trudeau: How promise of sunny days gave way to distrust

It could take years to overcome the animosity instilled during the near-decade of Justin Trudeau’s regime

When Justin Trudeau swept into power in 2015 with a majority mandate, it was partly due to his campaign slogan of “Sunny Days” resonating with voters. Some of those rays of positivity beamed upon bilateral ties with India too.

Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announces his resignation as Liberal leader and prime minister outside Rideau Cottage in Ottawa on Monday, (AP)

Trudeau, then leader of the Liberal Party, met India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Toronto, when the latter visited Canada in the spring of that year. After the election, Trudeau’s mandate letter to his international trade minister, Chrystia Freeland, expected her to focus “on expanding trade with large fast-growing markets” including India.

As the government completed a year in office, that optimism was sustained. As former Canadian high commissioner to New Delhi Peter Sutherland said at the time, “In my view, it’s important there’s a genuine commitment on both sides to keep them going forward and make sure there are regular visits at the ministerial level, to keep the files at the top of each country’s inbox, so to speak.”

At the end of the month, Trudeau appeared at a Khalsa Day celebration at Toronto’s Nathan Philips Square; the first sitting PM to attend the annual event since 2004. While that seemed innocuous on the surface and part of Trudeau’s shtick to play virtues of diversity, that event routinely features a parade with floats honouring the likes of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and Khalistani flags, and its 2017 iteration was no different. Gurpatwant Pannun, legal advisor to the hardline secessionist group, Sikhs for Justice or SFJ, predictably, welcomed Trudeau’s presence at the event, “It’s very important and we are glad he made an appearance.”

Ties could have been repaired when Trudeau visited India in February 2018.

But pro-Khalistan radicals were already feeling emboldened. In the winter of 2017, they threatened to bar Indian officials from gurdwaras in the country. Political space was granted to them to operate openly under the guise of freedom of expression. Meanwhile, as India attempted to woo those who were willing to eschew the Khalistan movement, the Trudeau Government attempted to scupper that initiative by denying its London-based spearhead Jasdev Singh Rai the electronic document required to travel to Canada.

Meanwhile, then Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amrinder Singh alleged that Trudeau was promoting extremist ministers and MPs. However, once Trudeau arrived in India, Singh allowed diplomacy to prevail, meeting the Canadian PM and four of his cabinet ministers. In fact, the paperwork accomplished during that visit was impressive, including an agreement to share intelligence. But it was overshadowed by Trudeau’s farcical costume changes during the trip, and, mainly, by the presence of a certain Jaspal Atwal at a reception organised by the Canadian government in Mumbai: Atwal was convicted in Canada for the murder of visiting Punjab Minister Malkiat Singh Sidhu in Vancouver Island in 1986.

Atwal famously turned up at the reception in Mumbai and was photographed with, among others, Trudeau’s then wife Sophie Gregoire, causing a firestorm in Canadian media. Ottawa later blamed “rogue elements” in the Indian government for subverting the visit, without explaining how they managed to plant Atwal at an invite-only event organised by the Canadian Government. Personally humiliated, Trudeau reacted by barring Indian officials in Canada from meetings with his ministers.

However, in December that year, the 2018 Public Report on the Terrorism Threat to Canada submitted by the public safety and emergency preparedness minister

listed, for the first time, Khalistani extremism. Blandly acknowledging a reality in the country, the report said, “While attacks around the world in support of this movement have declined, support for the extreme ideologies of such groups remains.” Four months later, in a stunning surrender to the same extremist groups, the government dropped the reference to Sikh/Khalistani extremism, with an updated version eliminated that and replaced it with the anodyne Extremists who Support Violent Means to Establish an Independent State Within India.

Indian officials were aghast at this capitulation before sustained pressure from some community groups in Canada and described the latest update as “full retreat” by Ottawa. The erasure came as reports emerged of some pressure groups within the community threatening the ruling Liberal Party with dire electoral consequences in a federal election year.

Trust and momentum in bilateral ties had been forfeited, never to be regained during Trudeau’s tenure. There were scattered episodes of positivity, like external affairs minister, S Jaishankar’s visit to Ottawa in December 2019 and India’s export of Covid-19 vaccines to Canada in the spring of 2021.

In fact, a cautious hope for rapproachement was renewed in 2023, as Canadian ministers visited India for the G20 and held meetings with counterparts. There was some expectation that Trudeau’s arrival in New Delhi for the leaders’ summit in September would be highlighted with the signing of an Early Progress Trade Agreement. Instead, as had been the case with relations with Canada under Trudeau, a step forward was followed by a dozen backward. Perhaps emblematic of the coming rupture was that Trudeau’s official aircraft remained stuck at Delhi airport for three days due to a technical fault.

Within days of his return to Ottawa, on September 18, he rose in the House of Commons and stated there were “credible allegations” of a potential link between Indian agents and the killing of pro-Khalistan figure Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey, British Columbia, three months earlier. More than a year later, on October 18, while testifying before the foreign interference committee in Ottawa, Trudeau said, “At that point it was primarily intelligence, not hard evidentiary proof.”

As both countries expelled an official each, there was no recovering from the damage caused. Through 2024, the focus, at the official level, was on damage limitation.

On October 14, India had withdrawn six diplomats and officials from Canada after Ottawa sent a formal communique seeking that New Delhi waive their diplomatic immunity so they could be interrogated in connection with violent criminal activity in the country. It also retaliated by expelling six Canadian diplomats stationed in India.

There’s no looking forward at this time. As the foreign interference committee releases its final report at the end of January, it is likely to emulate the June precedent established by a Parliament committee. The report by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians said India has “emerged as the second-most significant foreign interference threat to Canada’s democratic institutions and processes”, displacing Russia. India’s “foreign interference efforts have slowly increased” and extended beyond countering pro-Khalistan elements in Canada, it alleged.

At the end of October 2024, the National Cyber Threat Assessment 2025-2026 released by the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security defined India as among Canada’s “state adversaries”.

Recovering ground by Trudeau’s successor will be impossible in the short term. It could take years to overcome the animosity instilled during the near-decade of Trudeau’s regime. As many Canadians, who have suffered from the fallout of Trudeau’s policy blunders, will tell you: His mantra has gone from sunny ways to dark days. And that darkness has certainly enveloped the India-Canada bilateral relationship.