An Immigration and Refugee Tribunal (IRT) member issued a deportation order Friday against a Bishnoi gang associate accused of hiding a gun used in one of a series of shootings against a Surrey, B.C., café owned by famed Indian comedian and TV host Kapil Sharma.
Despite Jashandeep Singh’s protestations of innocence, IRB member Warren Puddicombe found reasonable grounds to believe the Edmonton-based student was a member of the transnational gang run from a jail cell in India by Lawrence Bishnoi.
Singh came to Canada from India in December 2022. Although he has never been charged with any crimes in Canada, a body of evidence ties him to a mid-level gang leader and a gun matched to shell casings found after a shooting at Kap’s Cafe in May 2025.
Puddicombe said video evidence showed Singh holding the gun to the head of a friend at a party last summer. And Snapchat messages later suggested he asked a female associate to hold the gun after Edmonton police picked up several gang members in a series of raids.
“This would then contribute to criminal aims for the group by keeping the gun from authorities,” Puddicombe said as he issued the deportation order against Singh.
“It becomes activity that is part of group’s criminal activity.”
International focus on Bishnoi
The deportation order comes just days after the actions of U.S. prosecutors threw a spotlight on the Bishnoi gang’s activities in the United States and Canada — and the organization’s reliance on foot soldiers like Jashandeep Singh to conduct a campaign of terror.
An indictment unsealed as part of Operation Hard Ball links the gang Lawrence Bishnoi has run from jail since 2015 to the 2023 assassination of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey as well as extortion cases in Ontario and British Columbia.
Police testimony at Jashandeep Singh’s admissibility hearing revealed new information about the organization of the gang and intra-gang rivalries.
An Edmonton police officer testified about a letter sent from the Bishnoi gang directly to police in Abbotsford, B.C., claiming to have 1,000 gunmen in Canada, ready to carry out extortions.
He said police believe a fracture in the group has “ultimately resulted in several different groups carrying out the same type of crime.”
Puddicombe said Bishnoi and childhood friend and North American lieutenant-turned-rival Goldy Brar — who is also named in the U.S. indictment — are responsible for murder, shootings and arsons across Canada.
Puddicombe also cited the involvement of another Bishnoi subcontractor named Goldy Dhillon, who has been tied to numerous extortion incidents in the Lower Mainland.
A party, a gun and bullet casings
Like many of those implicated in cases that have made their way into Canadian courts and immigration proceedings, Jashandeep Singh came to Canada as a foreign student. He was in the process of applying for a post-graduate work permit when he was arrested last summer.
Police identified him through a connection to Arshdeep Singh, the mid-level Bishnoi operator who visited Jashandeep Singh from Calgary last August to celebrate his birthday.
At the party, Jashandeep Singh was seen on video holding Arshdeep Singh’s gun to the head of a friend in what he maintained was horseplay. Further videos later caught them travelling with others to a spot where Arshdeep Singh fired the weapon into the air five times.
Edmonton police were able to recover casings from that incident and came up with a match for 9 mm shell casings found after the shooting at Kap’s Cafe in Surrey months earlier.
Café owner Kapil Sharma is one of the most famous comedians and entertainers in India, with more than 45 million followers on Instagram.
Last November, police in Delhi arrested a friend of Arshdeep Singh’s named Bandhu Maan Singh Sekhon who has been accused of masterminding three shootings at Kap’s Cafe — including the incident involving the gun tied to Jashandeep Singh.
IRB documents say Sekhon is a “high profile person of interest in relation to the ongoing extortion investigation and has been linked to Goldy Brar and Lawrence Bishnoi gangs.”
Fear of ‘a big action’
The gun itself — which has a distinctive pink slider — has never been found.
But Puddicombe said evidence presented at Jashandeep Singh’s admissibility hearing suggests Singh handed the weapon off to a friend.
Testifying earlier on his own behalf, Singh claimed he gave the friend documents, not a gun. He also claimed he didn’t know the weapon was real and said he had been intoxicated by cannabis gummies when he held it to his friend’s head.
He also denied any link to the Bishnoi gang, blaming inconsistent statements about the events given to Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) officer on fear for his status in Canada.
But Puddicombe rejected Singh’s testimony.
“He said he was scared that if he said anything there would be ‘big action’ on him … that he would be arrested and put in jail,” Puddicombe said.
“I don’t accept that his being scared was a reasonable explanation for the blanket denials that he gave.”
Banned from Canada for life
CBC News has reported extensively on Arshdeep Singh’s admissibility hearing last year, which revealed his ties to arsons and shootings in Ontario, Alberta and B.C.
Arshdeep Singh — who came to Canada as a student in August 2022 — was living on a post-graduate work permit due to expire in April 2026.
He was deported after being found inadmissible to Canada last December due to organized criminality, one of dozens of suspects identified by CBSA officials who form part of a multi-jurisdictional extortion task force.
At his hearing, Arshdeep Singh denied wrongdoing, but didn’t fight deportation, and the evidence against him has not resulted in criminal charges beyond shoplifting.
Following reporting by CBC News on the links between Arshdeep Singh and another extortion suspect named Sukhnaaz Singh Sandhu, the CBSA identified the deportation of both men as proof of expanded efforts to disrupt national extortion networks.
The deportation order against Jashandeep Singh means that he will not be able to return to Canada for the rest of his life without prior authorization.
He has been living with his sister and brother-in-law while he awaits the decision on whether he can stay in Canada.
Earlier in the admissibility proceedings, he said he feels ashamed and cannot look family members in the eye.
“My mother and father borrowed the money and sent me here so that I could make a good future for myself,” he said. “They had many hopes and dreams for me.”
