Open Secrets: The Explosive Memoirs of an Indian Intelligence Officer (44 page)

The situation, however, considerably improved after S.J.S. Chhatwal, a senior diplomat, assumed charge at the Ottawa Mission. A shaven Sikh, Chhatwal had the advantage of speaking the language and merging with the Sikh milieu. Under his guidance I took a crash course on reading and writing Gurmukhi and speaking
thet
(pure) Punjabi spoken in the
majha
area of Punjab. Sardar Harinder Singh, an aged India based ministerial staff coached me well and within three months I could read and write the language. I was soon to discover that the language of the rugged Punjabis was no less sweet than my mother tongue, Bengali. In fact I was charmed by the sweetness of the language. The admixture of Persian and Urdu had added a unique texture to the language that could express a lot in limited vocabulary. The common bondage of Sanskrit made my task easier. With the language barrier gone I suddenly discovered that the Punjabi vernacular media published from Toronto, Vancouver, New York and California had tonnes of intelligence to offer. After all open and published materials constitute 60% of the information pedalled as collected, collated and cooked intelligence by the professionals. I did not have, anymore, to depend on the mercies of Ashok Attri, the other Punjabi diplomat in the Mission.

I discussed the priorities of the Mission with Chhatwal. A seasoned diplomat as he was, Chhatwal advised me to prioritise my task in the flowing fashion:

·
        
Penetration of a few selected Gurdwaras.

·
        
Cultivation of a few identified targets amongst the most vocal section of the Sikh community.

·
        
Penetration of the Punjabi print and electronic media and control of the print and electronic media operated by the non-Sikh segments of the people of Asiatic and Indian origin.

·
        
Creation of a few clandestine human assets in the ‘lumpen’ segment of the Sikh workforce in Canada, who were more drawn to the separatist leaders and hate-preaching priests.

·
        
To reach out to the Indian community with saturated supplies of audio and videotapes on current affairs in India and specially filmed tapes on the atrocities committed by the Bhindranwale goons.

·
        
To convert the ‘
India News
’ to a quality publication with the help of a newly acquired fast printing/copying machine.

·
        
To meet the Canadian Foreign Office mandarins and the RCMP point men at regular intervals to brief them about developments back in India and to share whatever ‘
open
’ information the Indian Mission could cull out from the community through ‘
open
’ means.

·
        
To target the mainstream Canadian print and electronic media and sell the Indian side of the story.

·
        
To maintain ironclad cover and not to betray my involvement in intelligence generation.

·
        
To befriend key diplomats in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka Missions with a view to reaching some targeted members of the Pakistan Mission.

·
        
To generate a few ‘friends’ amongst the Canadian Members of Parliament.

The prioritised task list was shared with Joint Secretary (Personnel) in the MEA and he approved of the line of action. Gaurishankar Bajpai, an officer seconded from the R&AW, was not happy with the system of information sharing by his mother organisation. He too, like Chhatwal wanted to build up his own pool of intelligence and top up his portion of the cake with cream and cocoa. I did not mind as long as my cover was not blown up. However, I kept the Director Intelligence Bureau informed of all the developments and intelligence input. I could not trade my loyalty to my mother organisation for my transient comfort in Ottawa Mission.

The list was too unwieldy for a one-man army and a lone General. Chhatwal was not in the habit of saying no. I too hadn’t learned the use of negative language when it came to professional work. I saluted the General and accepted the task with a brave heart. Chhatwal favoured me by posting a regular MEA borne secretary at my disposal and a lady clerk to take care of my routine commitment in the I&P section of the Mission. He was gracious enough to share with me a little fund from his discretionary budget, a rare gesture by any senior diplomat. This was a great help, as I did not have access to the ‘secret service fund’ enjoyed by my colleague from the R&AW.

I must admit that Sunanda, my wife too pitched in a big way by cultivating the wives of the targeted community leaders, host country and third country diplomats and Canadian MPs and media persons.

So, our expectation of a ‘honeymoon posting’ had vanished. We were again rooted in for a bitter struggle. It was a challenging struggle to transform the sleepy Mission to a pro-active spearhead. Our job was rendered more hazardous after Operation Blue Star and Wood Rose back in the Punjab.

The Canadian political and diplomatic corps was more obsessed with the set theme of violation of human rights in the Punjab. They were yet to wake up to the menacing threat of terrorism. India was still a suspect in Canadian eyes. The propaganda machine of Pakistan and a few Islamic nations friendly to it were more active than we were in influencing the Canadian opinion makers. They poured in more money to oil their propaganda machine and they had found ready allies amongst the ‘hurt and bruised’ Canadian humanitarians and the misled Sikh population.

The USA and Canada were still enamoured of the Cold War ally Pakistan and its frontline involvement in Afghanistan. Sikh terrorism and the festering sore in Kashmir were viewed as failure of Indian statesmanship and diplomacy. They were yet to wake up to the truth that Sikh militancy was a by-product of Pakistan’s ‘unfinished agenda’ of partition and a vast quantity of resources pumped in Afghanistan to humiliate the Red Bear were being siphoned down to the Punjab militants.

The West was careless in using the Islamists to recreate Russia’s Vietnam in Afghanistan. The CIA, MI6 and Nationale de Securite and other ally intelligence outfits freely collaborated with Pakistan’s ISI. This was the historical ground where the USA sowed the seeds of its Frankenstein, Osama bin Laden.

The Reagan-Mulroney bonhomie did not only pitch for free trade and economic cooperation. The Conservative Canadian government almost blindly toed the Cold War initiative of its major partner. Moreover, the multicultural society of Canada was tuned to absorb the politics of protestation and democratic defiance. They were not expected to react in a manner that Delhi expected of them. The situation changed vastly after the assassination of Indira Gandhi and the sabotage of Air India Boeing 747 over the Atlantic. The Indian point of view on Sikh terrorism did gradually sink into psyche of the Canadian government and its security and intelligence agencies.

I was not any Cinderella to be pushed into the uncharted wild forest in Canada. I was acutely aware of the capability of the RCMP and the CSIS to monitor the movements and activities of foreign diplomats. Their job was made easier after Operation Blue Star, when the Chancery premises and our homes were put under physical presence of the RCMP. We were made to carry an armed security in our cars. Obviously our phones were on the hook of the RCMP and the CSIS. Surveillance on our movements and intelligence investigation of our ‘frequent social contacts’ were expected of the Canadian security and intelligence organisations.

I maintained an inscrutable straight face and liaison with my security point man in the Ministry of External Affairs on Sussex Drive and the RCMP counterpart in a designated meeting place. Later I had occasions to interact with the India desk in charge and the CIDA officials when I switched over from I&P to the political desk. But my undercover activities, strictly outside the charter of my assignment, continued uninterrupted.

I started with the up coming Ottawa Gurdwara on Prescott High Way. My training in Indian classical music and percussion instruments came to help. I made it a point to be there on most Sundays to attend and often participate in the
keertan
(devotional songs) and share
langar
with the Sikh gentry. The
ardas
(final prayer) was usually critical of Indira Gandhi, especially after the Blue Star and death of Bhindranwale. Some of the couplets were pretty offensive in nature. But I preferred to live with it and share the anger of the Sikh community over the destruction of the
Akal Takht
(seat of temporal power) and their demand for a separate homeland for the Sikhs. The audiotapes containing fanatical discourses of Bhindranwale were accompanied by display of photographs of the martyrs (slain terrorists).

The Hindu Punjabis had ceased visiting the Gurdwara out of mutual hatred and security considerations. They took initiative to construct a Hindu temple near Uplands, on way to Upper Canada Village. I provided discreet support to the venture and helped the organisers in raising funds. But I did not agree with their idea of boycotting the Sikhs and stop attending the Gurdwara. My tactics paid off well when S.J.S.Chhatwal joined the Mission. He picked up the fragile thread spun by me and utilised his Sikh identity to the fullest extent.

My resolve not to allow the ambience of hatred to firewall my professional initiative gradually endeared me to a section of the vocal Sikh community. I was granted access even to the extremist controlled Ross Street and Malton Road Gurdwaras in Toronto and Surrey and Westminster Sikh temples in Vancouver. The Sikh community in Edmonton, Regina and Winnipeg accepted me without reservation. Even the Bengali speaking Sikh of Winnipeg, Kuldip Singh Kohli, a close associate of Talvinder Singh Parmar, did not hesitate to have luncheon meetings with me. It was well neigh impossible to win over militant figures like Talvinder, Ajaib Singh Bagri, Satinder Pal Singh Gill, Labh Singh Rode (nephew of Bhindranwale) and scores of other hardened separatists. I did not aim that high too. The smooth access into the Sikh community had facilitated identification of targets close to the leaders of the Babbar Khalsa, World Sikh Organisation and International Sikh Youth Federation. At least two Punjabi language newspaper editors were ready games to cooperate with a view to isolating the mad fringe in the Sikh community and to putting an end to free ‘importation’ of criminalized militants from India to the peaceful and prosperous Sikh community in Canada. The militants later gunned down one of the editors for his suspected links with the RCMP and the CSIS.

It would be a vain claim to assert that the Indian High Commission had achieved complete penetration of the core of the Sikh militants. It was not impossible to carry out technical operations in a foreign country. But the MEA was not willing to override the R&AW and sounded a discreet advice that the High Commissioner should only depend on human assets. But I had managed to plant a micro tape recorder on one of the close associates of Labh Singh Rode, the ISYF chief, and get some of connectivity between the Sikh militant outfits in Ottawa and Toronto based Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) operatives of Pakistan. The Government of India had later shared some of these evidences with the Canadian authorities and Labh Singh was forced to leave Canada and seek refuge with his ISI mentors in Lahore.

It was altogether a different story with the Babbar Khalsa protagonists like Talvinder Singh Parmar, Ajaib Singh Bagri, Ripudaman Singh Malik and Surjan Singh Gill. Talvinder had finally fled India in 1982 in the wake of his involvement in heinous crimes. The Babbar Khalsa had always regarded Pakistan as a natural ally. They were opposed to Dam Dami Taksal brand of purist Sikh prescriptions and drew inspiration from the Kurd and Islamic Fidayeen rebels. Talvinder had visited Pakistan in 1979 and had struck a clandestine deal with the ISI. Under the patronage of the ISI the Babbars had organised some British Columbia Sikhs to support the hijackers of the Indian Airlines aircraft in September 1981.

Talvinder’s outfit International Babbar Khalsa acted through Surjan Singh Gill, a Canadian Sikh of Malayan origin, to establish networking with Jagjit Singh Chauhan (London), Ganga Singh Dhillon (USA), Dr. A.S. Sekhon (USA) and Karnail Singh Gill, an Ottawa based revenue department employee of the government of Canada. Criminals like Sewa Singh Lalli and Tarsem Singh Babbar later joined this network.

Talvinder’s activities took sinister proportions between 1984 and 1985. His involvement with experimentations with IED in rural localities in British Columbia had drawn attention of the RCMP sleuths. His masterstroke was to plan the downing of AI Boeing 747 Kanishka on June 23, 1985, and bomb explosions at Narita airport in Japan. Two more colleagues of Talvinder, Manjit Singh Kohli of Winnipeg and Inderjit Singh Riyat of Vancouver had played important role in these heinous crimes. Later the Hamilton conspiracy case, involving planned attacks on Indian aircrafts, demonstrated that the Babbars were determined to carry out acts of violence against Indian targets in Canada, the USA and UK.

I achieved a partial access into the core cadre of Talvinder through a talent based at Calgary. The High Commissioner provided the sinuses of the operation and I had succeeded in inducing the Calgary man to shift temporarily to Burnaby, near Vancouver city. He attained a place of prominence in a local Gurdwara and earned Talvinder’s confidence. He was later deputed by Talvinder to consult a Sikh flying trainer who operated at Sudbury, Ontario. I have reasons to believe that the flying instructor was not in any way involved with the downing of AI Boeing 747. He had shared with me the information that a close associate of Talvinder had evinced keen interest in flying mechanism of giant transcontinental birds. I had shared this information with Delhi well before the June ‘85 massacre in the air.