Talwinder Singh Parmar

Parmar was born in Panshta (Panchhat), Kapurthala, Punjab, India on 26 February 1944 .

Parmar immigrated to Canada in 1970,[1] and became a naturalized citizen of Canada.[4]

Parmar became involved in activities of the banned organisation Babbar Khalsa founded in 1978 and became its leader in Canada in 1979.

On 23 June 1985 BKI militants bombed Air India Flight 182 going from Montreal, Canada to New Delhi, India, over the Atlantic Ocean. All 329 passengers were killed, including 268 Canadian, 27 British and 24 Indian citizens.[4] Parmar and Inderjit Singh Reyat were arrested by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) on explosive charges, linking the two to the Air India Flight 182 bombing and 1985 Narita International Airport bombing. Parmar was acquitted of all charges. Inderjit Singh Reyat admitted to building the bomb, was convicted in the Air India bombing.[8] Reyat a member of the ISYF, was found guilty of manslaughter for making the bombs and had to spend more than 20 years in prison at Canada, and is the only individual convicted in these attacks as of 9 Feb 2009.[9][10][11]

The Commission of Inquiry into the Investigation of the Bombing of Air India Flight 182 concluded that Talwinder Singh Parmar "is now believed that he was the leader of the conspiracy to bomb Air India flights"[12]

Parmar later returned to India. He was killed in a gun fight with the Punjab police in 1992.[4]

In July 2007, the investigative magazine Tehelka reported that Parmar may have confessed to the Punjab police during interrogations preceding his death. He is accused of supplying the dynamite to Lakhbir Singh Rode, a nephew of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, who was claimed to have been the mastermind behind the bombing of Air India Flight 182.[13] Tehelka reported that Parmar had been interrogated in India between 9 and 14 October 1992, by senior police officers, where he claimed that the Air India 182 blasts were instigated by Lakhbir Singh Rode.[13]

Retired Punjab Police DSP Harmail Singh Chandi, the key official behind Parmar's arrest at Jammu in September 1992 and his subsequent interrogation before he was killed, eventually came forward with audiotapes and statements from Parmar's confessions. Despite being ordered to destroy these records, he had apparently preserved them in secret. The confession involved Parmar's version of the plot, designed to draw attention away from his primary involvement:

"Around May 1985, a functionary of the International Sikh Youth Federation came to me and introduced himself as Lakhbir Singh and asked me for help in conducting some violent activities to express the resentment of the Sikhs. I told him to come after a few days so that I could arrange for dynamite and battery etc. He told me that he would first like to see a trial of the blast...After about four days, Lakhbir Singh and another youth, Inderjit Singh Reyat, both came to me. We went into the jungle (of British Columbia). There we joined a dynamite stick with a battery and triggered off a blast. Lakhbir and Inderjit, even at that time, had in their minds a plan to blast an aeroplane. I was not too keen on this plan but agreed to arrange for the dynamite sticks. Inderjit wanted to use for this purpose a transistor fitted with a battery.... That very day, they took dynamite sticks from me and left.

Then Lakhbir Singh, Inderjit Singh and their accomplice, Manjit Singh, made a plan to plant bombs in an Air India (AI) plane leaving from Toronto via London for Delhi and another flight that was to leave Tokyo for Bangkok. Lakhbir Singh got the seat booking done from Vancouver to Tokyo and then onwards to Bangkok, while Manjit Singh got it done from Vancouver to Toronto and then from Toronto to Delhi. Inderjit prepared the bags for the flights, which were loaded with dynamite bombs fitted with a battery and transistor. They decided that the suitcases will be booked but they themselves will not travel by the same flights although they will take the boarding passes. After preparing these bombs, the plan was ready for execution by June 21 or 22, 1985. However, the bomb to be kept in the flight from Tokyo to Delhi via Bangkok exploded at the Narita airport on the conveyor belt. The second suitcase that was loaded on the Toronto-Delhi ai flight exploded in the air." - from alleged confession by Talwinder Singh Parmar[13]

After this interrogation, Parmar was killed in an exchange of fire between police and six militants in the early morning of October 15, 1992, near village Kang Arian in Phillaur sub-division. However, Tehelka claimed without any evidence that Parmar had been killed while in custody. Tehelka claimed there were discrepancies between the First Information Report (FIR) regarding the incident, and the post-mortem report. According to the FIR, Parmar was killed by AK-47 fire by SSP Satish K Sharma, firing from a rooftop, at 5:30 AM. The PMR shows that the line of fire of the three bullets are different, which is not possible if one person is firing from a fixed position. Also, the PMR says that the time of death was between 12am and 2am.

The tapes and statements are claimed to have been handed over to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and the John Major Commission of Inquiry that is reinvestigating the Kanishka blast. This was made possible through the efforts of the Punjab Human Rights Organisation (PHRO), a Chandigarh-based NGO that conducted interviews of Parmar's associates and prepared a comprehensive report over seven years. However, information and subsequent investigation from Canadian authorities firmly established Parmar was in fact the architect of the Air India Flight 182 and Air India Flight 301 terrorist plot.

Tehelka reports that "the PHRO's Principal Investigator Sarbjit Singh and lawyer Rajvinder Singh Bains flew to Canada along with Harmail in June and produced their findings before the Commission's counsels".[13] Official inquiry spokesman Michael Tansey told The Globe and Mail: "We're aware of this article in Tehelka, and we will explore this and any other allegations when the hearings resume in the fall."[14]

Meanwhile, Lakhbir Singh Rode, who is the head of the banned International Sikh Youth Federation, is now alleged to be living in Lahore.[13]