On 5 Dec, Brampton, Ontario Mayor Patrick Brown addressed the House of Commons’ Public Safety and National Security Committee, asserting that foreign interference did not influence the Conservative party’s last leadership race. However, Brown revealed that the Consul General of India expressed concerns about him using the term ‘Sikh nation’ to Conservative MP Rempel Garner. On the same day, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh moved a motion in the House of Commons’ Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development to recognize the 1984 anti-Sikh violence in India as a ‘genocide’. During the motion, Liberal MP Chandra Arya voted ‘no’, causing the motion to fail. Arya later accused Liberal MP Sukh Dhaliwal of threatening him in the House of Commons, alleging Dhaliwal accosted him in the lobby. In July 2024, UK’s Slough, London council withdrew a similar motion. In April 2017, the Ontario Assembly had passed the motion. In India, the terminology has had a trajectory of evolution with Sikhs calling the violence ‘pogrom’, ‘carnage’, ‘massacre’, and now ‘genocide’ but Indian media still calls it ‘riots’. On 10 May 2019, PM Narendra Modi recognized the violence as a genocide (SDW Vol 2, Issue 22, Story 1). Meanwhile, in a change of tone, India accused the US State Department of attempting to destabilize India in collaboration with investigative journalists for publishing articles that focused on the Adani Group’s ties to the Indian govt. and funding the INC. Last month, the Adani Group and seven others were indicted in the US for their involvement in a USD 265M bribery scheme (SDW Vol 2, Issue 48, Story 3). The US called the accusations ‘disappointing’ and denied charges.
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