Khalistani separatist’s kin in U.K. call for inquest

The family of Avtar Singh Khanda, a Khalistani separatist who died of acute leukemia in June 2023, has repeated its request for an inquest into the death, according to a report in The Guardian. He had been accused of being part of the protests outside the Indian High Commission in March 2023. Mr. Khanda had applied for asylum in the U.K. in 2016.

The Guardian report said that Michael Polak, a lawyer for the deceased’s family, had written to West Midlands coroner Louise Hunt, saying samples were not tested for “nerve agents, biological agents or nuclear agents”, which could have induced an aggressive form of cancer.

Mr. Polak had included in his letter a copy of the report from a forensic pathologist hired by lawyers for the Khanda family, which had said that while the initial toxicology reports did not reveal anything unusual, it could not rule out poisoning, especially by means of “exotic substances”. Friends and family of Mr. Khanda deny he was part of the March 2023 protests, as per a report in The Guardian from December 2023.

In March 2024, a probe by New Delhi concluded that a former rogue government agent was behind a murder-for-hire plot regarding Khalistani separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, in which he had been indicted by the U.S. authorities in November 2023.

The Indian government has also denied any involvement in the murder of another Khalistani separatist, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who was shot and killed in Canada in June 2023.