Indian law enforcement agencies say they are investigating alleged links between dozens of universities in Canada and two “entities” in Mumbai accused of illegally transporting students across the Canada-U.S. border.
A Tuesday news release from India's Enforcement Directorate, a multidisciplinary organization that investigates money laundering and foreign exchange laws, said a search in several cities has revealed “incriminating” evidence of “human trafficking.” “.
The allegations have not been proven in court. The federal government, the RCMP, the Indian high commission in Ottawa and several Canadian university officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The U.S. Embassy said Thursday it had no comment.
Indian officials say they launched their investigation after Jagdish Baldevbhai Patel, 39, was found dead along with his wife and two children near a border crossing between Manitoba and the United States on January 19, 2022.
Last month, a Minnesota jury found two men – Steve Shand, of Florida, and Harshkumar Patel, an Indian national arrested in Chicago – guilty of four counts related to bringing unauthorized persons into the United States, transporting them and profiting therefrom. .
Patel is a common name in India and the family was not related to the accused.
Prosecutors said Harshkumar Patel coordinated a sophisticated operation while Shand was the driver. Shand was supposed to pick up 11 Indian immigrants on the Minnesota side of the border, prosecutors said. Only seven survived the crossing on foot. Canadian authorities found the Patel family that same morning, freezing to death.
Harshkumar Patel and Shand have not yet been sentenced and could appeal.
Tuesday's news release said officials launched an investigation following a report filed against Bhavesh Ashokbhai Patel, who allegedly organized the family's trip.
Each family member was allegedly charged the equivalent of between $93,000 and $102,000 to cross into the United States from Canada, management claimed.
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The incident has been called the Dingucha case in India, after the village in the western Indian state of Gujarat where the family was originally from.
The Enforcement Directorate said it raided eight locations last week in Mumbai, Nagpur in Maharashtra state and Gandhinagar and Vadodara in Gujarat.
It also claims that Bhavesh Ashokbhai Patel allegedly arranged the admission of people to Canadian universities, which helped them obtain student visas. The news release did not specify the schools allegedly involved.
“Once individuals or students arrive in Canada, instead of entering university, they illegally crossed the US-Canada border and never entered universities in Canada,” he said.
The fee paid for admission to the university was then returned, he added.
The search found that around 25,000 students were referred by one “entity” and more than 10,000 students by another to various universities outside India each year, the statement said.
The network has around 1,700 agents in Gujarat and around 3,500 across India, of which 800 are active, he said.
The statement states that “around 112 Canadian-based universities” have signed an agreement with one entity, while “more than 150” universities have done so with another entity.
It is not clear from the statement if any university has ties to both entities.
Anil Pratham, a former senior police officer in Gujarat who has since retired, was involved in the investigation of the case as early as January 2022, when the Patel family died.
He told The Canadian Press that his team analyzed documentation, such as certificates and documents used by students to apply to colleges and universities abroad.
The police then contacted the villagers through various societies and asked them for help.
“We conveyed to the villagers that they should come out and tell us who the victims are and who the officers who live there are,” he said in an interview from Gujarat. “This helped us in our investigation.”
The process lasted almost three years because the first step is to establish the crime, charge, investigate and finalize those charges, he said.
The Gujarat police received help from their counterparts in Canada and New York, Pratham said.
He also gave advice for those who want to go abroad to study or work.
“There is a legal way to go from India to the country you want,” he said.
News of the Indian investigation comes amid tensions with the United States over border security, a federal rethinking of international student policy and diplomatic tensions with India over New Delhi's alleged attacks on Sikh activists in Canada.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has threatened to slap damaging tariffs on Canadian goods if Ottawa does not crack down enough on immigrants and drugs crossing illegally into the United States, prompting Ottawa to allocate $1.3 billion dollars in six years to address border security.
Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc and Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly traveled to Florida on Thursday to discuss border security and trade with the incoming US president.
Before that, Canada expelled six Indian diplomats in October, over accusations that they used their position to gather information on Canadians and then passed it on to criminal gangs who directly targeted individuals.
At the time, Canada also alleged that India's Home Minister ordered intelligence gathering operations against Sikh separatists who advocate the creation of an independent country called Khalistan in India. New Delhi rejects Ottawa's claims.