Murder of an East Indian girl on orders of her mother and her uncle
Jaswinder Kaur Sidhu, also known as Jassi was
a beautician
in Maple Ridge, British Columbia, Canada. On a
visit to the city of Jagraon, Ludhiana in the Punjab state of India in December 1994, Jassi
met and fell in love with Sukhwinder Singh Sidhu (nicknamed Mithu), who was a rickshaw driver. Jassi returned to Canada and
she and Mithu kept in touch over the next
four years.
For two years, Jassi and Mithu spoke by telephone and wrote love
letters. He wanted to sell his family land and move to Canada. By then, Jassi’s
mother wanted Jassi to marry. Jassi told her she wanted to go to India to find
a mate.In 1999, Jassi made another
trip to India with her mother, Malkiat Kaur Sidhu, an upstanding woman in Vancouver's Punjabi community and her brother, Surjit Singh
Badesha. However as far as Mithu and Jassi
were concerned, her intention of being in India was for the purpose of secretly
arranging a marriage between the two of them. They were subsequently married on March 15,
1999.
After Jassi, her mother and uncle had returned to Canada, upon learning
of the marriage between Jassi and Mithu, her mother and uncle told Jassi that
they strongly disapproved of the marriage, supposedly because Mithu was of a
lower status than they were.
Jassi was determined to bring Mithu to Canada to
start a new life despite the wrath of her mother and uncle. Because of the disapproval of her mother and uncle, Jassi sent a
letter to Ottawa on February 9, 2000, to the Immigration officials telling them
that her uncle might try to give them false information about Mithu. In fact that
is what her uncle actually did. Meanwhile
her mother and uncle attempted to persuade her to
get a divorce by beating her and offering to buy her a car after she divorced
her husband. When she refused their demands, she feared for her life after her family found out
about her secret marriage.
The next day, Jassi’s uncle, had an affidavit drawn up that said that Mithu and
his friends forced Jassi, at gunpoint, to marry Mithu. Actually, Badesha threatened to kill her and her husband if she
didn’t sign a letter falsely claiming the marriage was forced upon her. The
uncle forged Jassi's signature that he obtained from her under the pretence of
buying her a car to validate the complaint against Mithu.
Meanwhile, Jassi was confined to her home with her mother and uncle. She
was able to escape from the clutches of her mother and uncle with the help of
the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police). While she was being escorted out of
the house, her mother and uncle screamed insults at her.
When Jassi discovered that she had been betrayed, she managed to fax a
letter to the Indian Officials in India stating that the accusations in the
form sent earlier were false.
On April 13, 2000, Jassi flew to India
and she convinced the Indian authorities that Mithu was innocent and
subsequently, a judge granted bail to Mithu and he was released from jail six
days later.
On April 26, 2000, Jassi’s uncle began
calling Darshan Singh, a wealthy local businessman in the Punjab. Darshan
Singh's daughter later married Surjit Singh, her uncle’s son.
On June 7, 2000, Jassi’s mother learned
that her daughter and Mithu were in hiding at the home of Mithu’s grandparents.
She called them there and spokes to Jassi and Mithu. Jassi believed the call was
a peace offering and told her mother where they would be during the next few
days.
Despite all the benefits of Canada, with its human rights, laws
and politically powerful women, police and cultural experts say that Jassi
became caught in the wrath of her powerful Jat Sikh family after she married a
poor rickshaw driver without their permission. Although Jassi lived in a
suburb, worked at a mall, and had Canadian citizenship, that could not save her
from one of the most ancient and disgusting cruelties still committed against
women—honor killings.
The day after the phone call, they were attacked by a gang of men.
Mithu was badly beaten and left for dead. He was found and taken to a hospital in
Ludiahna. He told the police that his wife had been kidnapped.
That same day, Jassi was taken to a farmhouse outside Ludihana where she was told
by the men that kidnapped her that her husband was dead. One of the kidnappers, Ashwani Kumar, phoned
Jassi’s mother and uncle who were still in in Maple, British Columbia by cell
phone. He wanted to know what they were to do with Jassi. According to Indian
police, Jassi’s mother ordered Ashwani Kumar to kill Jassi. He followed her
instructions and while Jessi was being held down by the other kidnappers, she
was briefly tortured and then Ashwani Kumar slit the screaming girl’s throat. She was likely tortured and murdered with a kirpan (small
knife) seen in the hands of one of the
assailants, and probably the same blood-stained kirpan later found by police at
the farm of one of the convicted men. Her
body was later found a few days later, dumped in an
irrigation canal 45 km (28 miles) from Kaonke Khosa. She was 25 when she
was murdered.
On the 18th of June, the Indian police seized weapons, cars and mobile phones from the 11 men
suspected of kidnapping and killing Jassi. On July 9, the Indian police arrested
the 11 men connected with the murder of Jassi and they admitted that the murder
was an honour killing. Two days later, the police announced that they
had issued arrest warrants for Jassi’s mother and uncle. Now one would think
that soon after, those two evil bugs would be extradited to India to face the
charges of murder. Well, it didn’t happen for quite a long time.
Meanwhile, in 2004, Mithu was re-arrested
and charged with the rape of a servant of Darshan Singh, a serious charge for
which bail is rarely granted. It was obviously a frame up. He was incarcerated in the Ludhiana Central Jail for four years. His release on
April 29, 2008 came about because of the efforts of Harbinder
Singh Sewak, who publishes the South
Asian Post. He hired lawyers in India to prove Mithu’s innocence and they
were successful.
On October 21, 2005, seven of the eleven
men arrested were convicted in plotting and killing Jassi. They included
Darshan Singh (the wealthy businessman) and former police officer Joginder
Singh and Ashwani Kumar who slit Jassi’s throat. They were given life sentences
for Jassi’s murder and the attempted murder of Mithu.
The extradition to India from Canada of Malkit Kaur Sidhu and Surjit
Singh Badesha, (the two bugs who arranged for the murder of Jassi) was as to be
expected, stonewalled by Canadian and British
Columbia authorities. For
nine years, those two evil bugs remained free. However, on January 5, 2012, arrest warrants under the Canadian Extradition Act were issued for the
mother and uncle by the Supreme Court of British Columbia. The two were
arrested the following day. They were kept in custody until May 30, 2013 when
the two bugs were extradited to India to face the charges of first
degree murder.
The victim’s mother, Malkit Kaur Sidhu, and her brother,
Surjit Singh Badesha are still facing trial in India for conspiracy to commit
murder in her death.
I have no doubt in my mind that those
two bugs will be spending the rest of their lives in a filthy decrepit prison
or alternatively, hanged by their necks until they are dead. So far, I can’t
find anything in the Internet with respect to their pending trials. That could
be because it can take quite a while before trials of accused persons in India
finally are scheduled.
There is no doubt in my mind that those
two bugs will be convicted. There
were more than 250 calls between Badesha and some of those men beginning
immediately after the illicit marriage came to light. The calls peaked the day
his niece, Jassi Sidhu was killed. Further, the Indian police alleged in the previous trials that the contract
killers were allegedly paid about $50,000 in Canadian money by Sidhu's mother,
Malkiat Kaur and uncle Surjit Singh Badesha, a millionaire blueberry farmer in
Maple Ridge. That information is going
to be used against those two bugs at their trials. It will hit them like Raid
hits other insects.
I will keep my readers up to date as I
learn more about what is happening to those two bugs. Whatever I learn will be
placed at the end of this article.
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