In a sharply worded and at times confrontational interview on Canada's state-backed broadcaster CBC on Tuesday, India's High Commissioner to Canada, Dinesh Patnaik, accused Canadian authorities of having "failed for 40 years" to act against terrorist elements operating on their soil, saying Ottawa's long inaction had created a permissive environment for extremism and violence targeting India.
The interview, which came as British Columbia Premier David Eby leads a trade mission to India and as Ottawa signals a thaw in ties with New Delhi, quickly moved beyond economics and into the most sensitive fault line in the bilateral relationship: allegations surrounding the killing of Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar and Canada's broader handling of the extremist groups.