Bagri and Malik were arrested and charged on Oct. 27, 2000. They were held without bail until their acquittal almost four and a half years later. The trial lasted from April 2003 to December 2004.

The Air India investigation was launched by Ottawa as part of a campaign backed by the Indian government against forces advocating independence for Punjab, a state in northwestern India largely inhabited by Sikhs, a national minority in the country. On June 5, 1984, India’s army waged an assault, killing hundreds at the Golden Temple in Amritsar—the most important Sikh holy site. On October 30 of the same year, India’s prime minister, Indira Gandhi, was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards. Following the killing, Gandhi’s Congress Party organized a pogrom that led to the slaughter of thousands of Sikhs.

Both Bagri and Malik are Sikh religious leaders. Bagri was a leader of Babbar Khalsa, a group that advocates independence for Punjab. In June 2003, Ottawa banned Babbar Khalsa and the International Sikh World Federation after branding them “terrorist.”

Through the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS), Ottawa joined the campaign against “Sikh terrorism.” The police inquiry was the largest and most expensive international investigation Canadian authorities have ever undertaken. In a major assault on democratic rights, thousands of Sikhs were spied upon, wiretapped, interrogated, or held in jail or immigration centers without ever being convicted of any crime.

This campaign whipped up racist attitudes toward Sikhs. In 1998, Nirmal Singh Gill, a caretaker at a Sikh temple in Surrey, near Vancouver, was beaten to death by a group of skinheads. About 1,000 people rallied to protest the racist murder.

In his ruling for the acquittal of Bagri and Malik, Judge Ian Bruce Josephson said, “Justice is not achieved…if persons are convicted on anything less than the requisite standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The evidence has fallen markedly short of that standard.”

The two defendants spent well over four years behind bars in a case that was based on circumstantial evidence. “The prosecution had no witnesses with firsthand information or any physical evidence that could be tied directly to either Mr. Malik or Mr. Bagri,” the Toronto Globe and Mail reported. The judge found that several witnesses who claimed they had heard the defendants admit to the crime lacked credibility.

“I have been accused of horrendous crimes and have been imprisoned for over four years while these charges were before the court,” said Bagri in a statement read by his daughter outside the court after the verdict was announced.

“In 1985, when these terrible events occurred, I was a passionate advocate for an independent homeland for the Sikh people,” Bagri’s statement continued. “But I want to repeat publicly today what I have told the authorities numerous times since 1985: that I had absolutely no involvement in any of these criminal activities.”

“Our dad has been found to be innocent. Our justice system is based on the principle of innocent until proven guilty. Please remember that a verdict of not guilty is a verdict of innocent,” Malik’s children said in a statement. “They had given these families [of those who died in the crash] a false hope of justice by proceeding with a case without merit. The focus must now be on how CSIS, the RCMP and Crown have handled this case, on who is actually responsible for this heinous crime, and on exposing the witnesses who lied in search of attention and money.”

One person charged in the case, Inderjit Singh Reyat, pleaded guilty to manslaughter on Feb. 10, 2003, and was sentenced to five years in jail. However, he was only found guilty of acquiring “materials for the purpose of aiding others in making of explosive devices…he did not arm an explosive device, nor did he place an explosive device on an airplane, nor does he know who did or did not do so.” Reyat had previously been sentenced to 10 years in prison for manslaughter in the death of the two airport workers in Japan. His conviction was based on circumstantial evidence.

The media coverage after the acquittal continued the effort to use the case to boost the government’s repressive apparatus. “Ill-equipped, ill-prepared and looking for the wrong target,” said an article in the Toronto Star. “In 1985, Canada’s fledgling security agency—the Canadian Security Intelligence Service—was preoccupied with sniffing out Soviet spies and rooting out subversion. Probing possible terror attacks was down the list of priorities for CSIS.”

The prosecution has 30 days to appeal. So far the government has rejected a proposal for a public inquiry into the Air India case.

Meanwhile, Ottawa is pursuing its effort to use the “fight against terrorism” to undermine democratic rights, including by toughening immigration laws. In a ruling released March 22, for example, federal judge Eleanor Dawson upheld the use of a national-security certificate against Mohamed Harkat. This means that he will continue to be held in an Ottawa jail, where he has been detained for two years pending deportation as a “security threat.” The government has accused Harkat of association with al-Qaeda.

“It’s an unjust decision, from what I can see,” said Christian Legeais, a spokesperson for Harkat’s defense committee. “It’s only based on evidence presented in secret.”

Under a national-security certificate Ottawa doesn’t have to give the accused or their lawyers the evidence it claims to possess and may present it secretly to the courts.

On March 23, Justice Minister Irwin Cotler announced that Canadian citizens suspected of “terrorist” ties could also be subjected to “control measures” like house arrest. Such measures are currently being developed for immigrants accused of “terrorist” activity or association. Under a 2001 law, authorities already have the power to arrest and jail citizens, with a judge’s approval, if they claim the detention would prevent an imminent “terrorist” act.  
 
 
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