Inside the world of Lawrence Bishnoi, the Indian gangster Canada says India is using as a proxy

The high-profile murder of a Punjabi rapper, repeated death threats against a Bollywood star and the killing of a Mumbai-based politician earlier this month — all are alleged to be the work of one of India's most feared gangsters, Lawrence Bishnoi. 

The latest addition to that list is the RCMP's claim that the Bishnoi gang is targeting members of the pro-Khalistan movement on Canadian soil, allegedly at the behest of the Indian government.

The RCMP's assistant commissioner Brigitte Gauvin name-dropped the Bishnoi group last Monday during a stunning news conference in which the Mounties outlined allegations that top Indian diplomats were engaged in criminal activity in Canada. Gauvin specified that investigators believe the gang is "connected to agents of the government of India." 

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also made the explicit connection during his testimony at a commission investigating foreign interference last week.

He stated that diplomats collected information on Canadians who were "in disagreement" with the government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then passed that information to "the highest levels" of the Indian government before it was directed to "criminal organizations like the Lawrence Bishnoi gang," ending in "violence against Canadians on the ground."

Indian officials have rejected the accusations as "preposterous," in turn accusing Canada of harbouring violent members of a group that calls for the creation of a separate Sikh homeland called Khalistan, and claiming the ruling Liberals are trying to win votes from the country's large Sikh community.

Last Thursday, India's foreign ministry pointed out that there are 26 pending extradition requests for gangsters, including members of the Bishnoi group, that India wants returned and prosecuted, which they say Canada has ignored. 

"This is a contradiction in terms, which we don't understand," said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal, calling it "really strange" that Canada is linking Indian government agents to the same gangsters India says it wants extradited. 

The RCMP mention is yet another example of the expanding international influence of the 31-year-old Bishnoi, who despite having been in prison for the past nine years has only seen his notoriety grow. 

Bishnoi's group may have started their criminal path with small-time intimidation in student politics on a university campus in Punjab, but the gangster's reach now extends across not only North America but "Europe and the Gulf states, and other areas with significant Punjabi diaspora communities," said Delhi-based journalist Deepak Bhadana, who has spent the last few years investigating Bishnoi's activities for the television station News9. 

Indian investigators estimate Bishnoi controls a gang of 700 members across several Indian states, with Punjab police tracking some 2,500 known hideouts, used by the group's hitmen, in that state alone.

Bishnoi himself has more than 30 criminal cases pending against him. 

The general assumption is that the gang's major operations, ranging from extortion to targeted assassinations, are orchestrated by Bishnoi from behind bars, using cell phones and encrypted messages.

Gurmeet Chauhan, a senior officer in Punjab's anti-gangster task force, told BBC News that Bishnoi "runs his gang seamlessly from prison without needing to co-ordinate everything."