The United States Department of Justice has unsealed indictments against 37 individuals linked to three India-based organised crime syndicates, accusing them of murder-for-hire, extortion, kidnapping, and large-scale drug trafficking. The charges, part of the long-running international investigation Operation Hard Ball, were announced on 8 July and have led to 24 arrests across the United States, Canada, and Spain. Among those indicted are Lawrence Bishnoi, currently imprisoned in India, and his associate Goldy Brar, who remains a fugitive; both are alleged to have ordered the 2023 killing of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia, as well as issuing threats against Bollywood actor Salman Khan to instil fear and promote their criminal enterprise.

Viewed from Washington, the operation signals a determination to dismantle networks that, according to US Assistant Attorney Bill Esaili, ‘spread fear, drugs, and violence’ across borders. Canadian Justice Minister Sean Fraser described the arrests as a ‘significant opportunity’ to reduce the harm caused by organised crime in Canadian communities. However, Sikh advocacy groups, including the World Sikh Organisation of Canada and the Toronto-based Sikh Federation, while welcoming the enforcement action, have called for greater transparency regarding potential links to foreign state agencies. These demands reference Ottawa’s earlier assertion that it possessed evidence of Indian government involvement in Nijjar’s murder—a claim New Delhi has denied, leading to a deterioration in bilateral relations and reciprocal expulsions of diplomats.

Court documents detail the decentralised structure of the Bishnoi syndicate, which recruited impoverished minors in India and dispatched loyal members abroad on fraudulently obtained student and work visas to support operations in North America. The indictment also describes a parallel drug trafficking network allegedly led by Ravinder Singh Dhanda from British Columbia, which used long-haul trucks and farm vehicles to smuggle hundreds of kilograms of cocaine and methamphetamine weekly from the US into Canada. A separate filing alleges that a Canada Border Services Agency employee passed inspection-related information to a member of the Dhanda ring, prompting the RCMP to acknowledge it is ‘aware’ of the allegation but declining to confirm an investigation. In a related case, Guramrit Sidhu, a 63-year-old Ontario man who pleaded guilty to running a similar cross-border smuggling operation, was sentenced in Los Angeles to 20 years in prison. Meanwhile, a US federal court in Texas sentenced Mexican national Arturo Leija Alvarado to 27 years for trafficking over a tonne of methamphetamine concealed in lettuce shipments, highlighting the continued flow of narcotics across the southern border.

Extradition proceedings are now underway for three Canadian defendants—Jaskarn Baghri, Ravinder Dhanda, and Gurtej Singh Smagh—who appeared in British Columbia Supreme Court for a bail hearing this week. US authorities are seeking 10 additional fugitives. In Nova Scotia, the RCMP has referred a separate police shooting that injured a suspect to the province’s Serious Incident Response Team, while in Prince Edward Island, the RCMP announced enhanced traffic enforcement for a music festival weekend. The investigation into the alleged CBSA leak remains ongoing, with no charges laid. The diplomatic standoff between Ottawa and New Delhi persists, with Sikh organisations pressing investigators to disclose whether any foreign state connections have been identified and what measures are being taken to dismantle these networks.