The illusion of India as the world’s largest democracy has been shattered. It was not fractured by political debate, but by bullets fired on Canadian soil, by abduction plots foiled in New York, and by the brazen appointment of a man implicated in torture and murder to lead the nation’s foreign intelligence agency. The Indian state is no longer just a regional power; it is operating a global assassination program with absolute impunity.
Any doubt about the state’s intentions was erased this week with the promotion of Parag Jain to the chief of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). This is not a routine bureaucratic shift; it is a declaration of contempt for human rights and international law. Long before being accused of silencing activists in Canada, Jain was implicated in making a 19-year-old boy vanish forever. In 1993, Sukhdev Singh was abducted, tortured, and murdered under his command. His family was never able to bury him; his body was disposed of in a secret cremation. Knowing this, the accusation of “orchestrating campaigns” in Canada feels less like a political tactic and more like a familiar promise of what happens to those who speak too loudly. He was never held accountable. Now, he runs RAW.
His appointment legitimizes the agency’s criminal methods. According to U.S. prosecutors, RAW has devolved into a state-sanctioned hit squad, weaponizing India’s criminal underworld by coercing offenders into carrying out assassinations abroad. As one informant revealed, the choice was simple: kill a Sikh activist or face punishment back in India. This isn’t spycraft. This is terror.
Western intelligence agencies know it. A former top executive at Canada’s CSIS labeled India’s operations “unprofessional” and a gross violation of sovereignty. His words are backed by hard evidence. The Canadian government has publicly accused Indian agents of murdering Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian citizen, in a public act of terror. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Justice has indicted Indian nationals, exposing a clear line of command in a plot to assassinate another activist in New York City.
This is not speculation; it is a pattern of criminal behavior documented by India’s own democratic partners in Washington, Ottawa, London, and Canberra. The mask has slipped.
In response, Sikh organizations are demanding what should be the bare minimum: a public inquiry, a suspension of all intelligence-sharing, and a freeze on diplomatic relations until the campaign of repression ends. These are not radical proposals. They are a rational response to a state that wages war on citizens across the world.
The question is no longer if a democracy can turn dark, but what the world will do when it proudly brandishes its criminality. A government’s most basic promise is to protect its people. But what do you call it when that government hunts its critics across oceans? When it stoops to hiring street criminals as foreign policy tools? When the man it chooses to lead its spies is one accused of taking a young boy’s life? That isn’t a democracy anymore; it’s a betrayal masquerading as one. It’s a house that may look stable from the outside, but whose foundation is rotted by impunity. You cannot fix such a house with quiet words and diplomatic handshakes.
Accountability must be demanded.
