India angered by apparent Sikh parade float in Canada portraying assassination

OTTAWA — India’s foreign minister has condemned images of a parade said to have occurred in Brampton, Ont., which seemed to portray the 1984 assassination of prime minister Indira Gandhi by her two Sikh bodyguards.

The Canadian Press has not verified the source of a short video that appears to show a parade float on a suburban street with men in turbans pointing guns at a woman who resembles Gandhi.

India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar argued the incident shows Ottawa’s lax approach to extremism.

He said the incident “is not good for relationships” and “not good for Canada.”

New Delhi has long argued that Canada’s free-speech approach to Sikh separatists goes too far, with some temples found to be openly venerating people connected with acts of violence such as the 1985 bombing of an Air India flight.

Canada’s envoy to India also condemned the parade, saying he was “appalled” by reports that it celebrated the assassination. “There is no place in Canada for hate or for the glorification of violence. I categorically condemn these activities,” Canada’s high commissioner to India, Cameron MacKay, wrote on Twitter.

At a Thursday press conference in New Delhi, Jaishankar said his government is puzzled that Ottawa gives so much freedom to those advocating for an independent state they call Khalistan.

“It isn’t only one incident, no matter how egregious it may be,” Jaishankar told reporters.

“There is a larger underlying issue about the space which is given to separatists, to extremists, to people who advocate violence,” he said.