Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s arrival in India on Friday will mark a major second for the bilateral relationship that has gone via an arc of downs and ups over the past two-and-half years.
Carney will land in Mumbai and later go to New Delhi for talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, earlier than wrapping up his journey on March 2.
Even a 12 months again, such a go to would have been unthinkable. Bilateral ties unravelled in 2023 beneath Justin Trudeau over the killing of pro-Khalistani separatist Hardeep Nijjar. The unprecedented diplomatic disaster had political, financial and geopolitical penalties. The influence on the people-to-people ties, too, was immense.
After Carney took cost in early 2025, each the Canadian and Indian governments put in an amazing quantity of heavy-lifting to construct again the connection and defend it from the fallout of Trudeau’s Nijjar allegations. And as US President Donald Trump upends the world together with his commerce insurance policies, this relationship assumes extra significance than ever.
The bombshell
In September 2023, then prime minister Justin Trudeau dropped a bombshell allegation within the Canadian parliament, saying the Indian authorities might have had a hand within the June assasination of Khalistani separatist Nijjar in British Columbia province.
Trudeau mentioned he had taken up the problem with Prime Minister Modi throughout his go to for the G20 Leaders’ Summit in September.
The Ministry of Exterior Affairs referred to as Trudeau’s accusation “absurd and motivated”. It mentioned he had made related allegations throughout his assembly with the PM, which had been “utterly rejected”.
Story continues under this advert
The diplomatic escalation occurred quickly. Each side expelled diplomats, closed down consulates and withdrew Excessive Commissioners. These had been significantly drastic steps, often taken in conditions comparable to wars and terrorist assaults.
Prime Canadian officers — nationwide safety and intelligence advisor Nathalie Drouin and deputy minister of overseas affairs David Morrison — additionally linked India’s Residence Minister, Amit Shah, to an alleged marketing campaign of concentrating on Sikh separatists in Canada.
The Indian authorities responded sharply to the allegations and referred to as Canada a “secure haven” for “terrorists, extremists and organised crime”. Such descriptions are often reserved for Pakistan and Afghanistan, and it was uncommon for India to make use of them for a Western democracy.
The restoration
The needle started to maneuver in January 2025, when Trudeau introduced he would step down. Carney changed Trudeau as prime minister in March and his Liberal social gathering received the overall election in Might, cementing him within the position.
Story continues under this advert
A former central banker, Carney was eager to reset ties with India, a significant financial associate. He approached the Nijjar killing as a legislation enforcement and judicial challenge that was finest delinked from political and financial relations. So, he made the primary transfer by inviting Modi to the G7 leaders’ outreach summit in June final 12 months in Kananaskis, Canada.
Following a “optimistic” assembly, each leaders “agreed to take calibrated and constructive steps to revive stability” in their relationship, beginning with the “early return of Excessive Commissioners to one another’s capitals”. The thaw led to the reinstatement of envoys and diplomats, lifting of visa curbs, and reciprocal visits over the past eight months on the overseas minister and NSA stage.
To firewall the connection from the Nijjar investigation, each side have created a separate framework beneath their Nationwide Safety Advisors to debate “transnational crimes”. This mechanism is particularly meant to handle the issues associated to pro-Khalistani actions in Canada.
The pillars of the connection
However the comparatively transient pressure in ties, India and Canada have sometimes loved sturdy cooperation in sectors comparable to politics, enterprise, funding and people-to-people relationships. Right here’s a take a look at the pillars of cooperation and how the 2 governments want to construct on them.
Story continues under this advert
Commerce and financial ties
Finally 12 months’s G20 Leaders’ Summit, Canada and India agreed to formally launch negotiations for an formidable Complete Financial Partnership Settlement to double two-way commerce to $70 billion by 2030. In 2024, India was Canada’s seventh-largest items and companies buying and selling associate, with two-way commerce at $30.8 billion.
India’s main exports to Canada are pharmaceutical merchandise, equipment elements and mechanical home equipment, iron and metal merchandise, digital items, natural chemical substances, jewellery, gems, textile and seafood. India’s main imports from Canada embrace pulses, fertilizers (potash) and minerals.
In line with the Division for Promotion of Trade and Inner Commerce, Canada is the seventeenth largest overseas investor in India. Its cumulative funding of $4.18 billion from April 2000 to June 2025 represented 0.56% of the overall FDI inflows into India.
Safety and defence
India and Canada have recurrently engaged in dialogue and cooperation on international safety points, together with counter-terrorism, cyber safety and regional stability. The counter-terrorism engagement has largely taken place via the framework of the ‘Joint Working Group on Counter Terrorism’ arrange in 1997. Each side additionally enhanced safety cooperation via one other framework on ‘Countering Terrorism and Violent Extremism’ signed in February, 2018. Canada’s nationwide safety and intelligence advisor, Drouin, met India’s NSA, Ajit Doval, in New Delhi on 18 September, 2025. Doval visited Canada from 6-7 February, 2026 and met Canada’s Minister of Public Security Gary Anandasangaree and Drouin.
Story continues under this advert
Vitality
With Canada’s huge pure sources and India’s increasing power demand, power cooperation stays a key pillar of the bilateral relationship. The partnership encompasses each typical and renewable sources, with Canada pitching itself as a dependable provider of oil, fuel, LNG, LPG, crude oil, and vital minerals.
Training
The schooling sector has considerably strengthened people-to-people ties between the 2 international locations. Indian college students characterize the biggest group of worldwide college students in Canada. Greater than 3.92 lakh Indian college students had been finding out in Canada as of December 31, 2024. Each international locations have lengthy recognised the strategic significance of upper schooling and analysis. The tutorial ties embrace institutional linkages, joint analysis applications and tutorial mobility initiatives.
Diaspora
With over 1.8 million Indo-Canadians and roughly one million non-resident Indians, Canada is dwelling to one of many largest and most vibrant Indian diasporas on this planet. Indo-Canadians have had a profound influence throughout a variety of sectors, and their affect continues to develop.
Diplomats who’ve handled Canada say pro-Khalistan components are a small minority within the Canadian Sikh neighborhood and had hijacked the Trudeau authorities’s India coverage. Estimates recommend that of the about 20 lakh Indian diaspora, solely about eight lakh are Sikhs. Of them, Indian estimates say, solely about 1% — 8,000-9,000 folks — are pro-Khalistan radicals.
Story continues under this advert
However this small inhabitants of Khalistanis management 12-15 gurdwaras, the place they generate funds and organise politically. The constituencies by which they’ve a say are principally in Brampton in Ontario province, and Vancouver and Surrey in British Columbia.
Geopolitics
Canada is a vital strategic associate for main western powers — it’s a part of the G7 grouping and shares the desk with the US, UK, Germany, France, Italy, and Japan. It additionally shares intelligence with the 5 Eyes grouping which additionally consists of the US, the UK, Australia and New Zealand.
All these international locations are additionally shut strategic companions for India.
Final fall, on the margins of the G20 Leaders’ Summit, Canada, India and Australia entered into a brand new trilateral know-how and innovation partnership to deepen strategic collaboration on vital and rising applied sciences and drive additional diversification of provide chains towards a safe, sustainable, and resilient future.
Story continues under this advert
Carney’s go to is predicted to provide a fillip to all these sectors and extra, particularly with Trump’s actions affecting Canada and India.
Source link
#India #Canada #mended #frayed #ties
