Air India Flight 182 was a scheduled international flight from Toronto Pearson International Airport (as Air India Flight 181) to Mumbai’s Sahar International Airport with regular Mirabel-London-Delhi stops. On the morning of June 23, 1985, the Boeing 747 serving the Montreal-London segment exploded near the coast of Ireland from a bomb planted by Sikh terrorists from the Babbar Khalsa. All 329 people on board were killed including 268 Canadian citizens, 27 British citizens, and 22 Indian citizens. The bombing of Air India Flight 182 is the worst terrorist attack in Canadian history and was the world's deadliest act of aviation terrorism until the September 11 attacks in 2001. It remains the deadliest aviation incident in the history of Air India, and the deadliest no-survivor hull loss of a single Boeing 747.
The perpetrators are believed to be Inderjit Singh Reyat, a dual British-Canadian national, who pleaded guilty in 2003, and Talwinder Singh Parmar, who was one of the key individuals associated with the Khalistani separatist group, Babbar Khalsa. The plot included a second bomb, intended to explode on the same day and murder the occupants of Air India Flight 301 serving the Tokyo-Bangkok-Delhi route. Instead, it killed two baggage handlers at Tokyo's Narita International Airport when the bomb suitcase was being transferred from the original Canadian airplane to the Air India 747; fragments from this bomb proved Reyat's involvement. The two bombs had started their journey when checked onto a pair of Canadian Pacific Air Lines flights from Vancouver International Airport, one headed to Tokyo – for connection with Air India Flight 301, and one to Montreal – for connection with Air India Flight 182.
The plan's execution had transnational consequences and involved citizens and governments from five nation states. Babbar Khalsa was implicated but not confirmed to be responsible for the bombing. Although a handful of people were arrested and tried for the Air India bombing, the only person convicted was Inderjit Singh Reyat, who pleaded guilty in 2003 to manslaughter. He was sentenced to fifteen years in prison for assembling the bombs that exploded on board Air India Flight 182 and at Narita.
The subsequent investigation and prosecution lasted almost twenty years. This was the most expensive trial in Canadian history, costing nearly C$130 million. The two accused, Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri, were both found not guilty.
The Governor General-in-Council in 2006 appointed the former Supreme Court Justice John C. Major to conduct a commission of inquiry into the failure to prevent the terrorist acts, compounded by the failure to achieve convictions of any perpetrators beyond the bomb maker. His report, which was completed and released on 17 June 2010, concluded that a "cascading series of errors" by the Government of Canada, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) had allowed the militant attack to take place.
Background
During the 1970s, many Sikhs emigrated to western Canada. These included men who later became leaders and members of the Babbar Khalsa including Talwinder Singh Parmar, Ajaib Singh Bagri, Ripudaman Singh Malik and Inderjit Singh Reyat. By the 1980s, the area around Vancouver, British Columbia, had become the largest centre of Sikh population outside India.
In India on 13 April 1978 a convention organized by the Sant Nirankari Mission took place at the time of the important Sikh festival of Vaisakhi, a celebration of the birth of Khalsa. The convention was led by Gurbachan Singh, leader of the Sant Nirankari Mission, and was organized in Amritsar with permission from the Akali Dal-led government of the state of Punjab. The practices of the Sant Nirankari were considered heresy by the school of orthodox Sikhism expounded by Bhindranwale. A procession of about 200 Sikhs led by Bhindranwale and Fauja Singh of the Akhand Kirtani Jatha (AKJ) left the Golden Temple, heading towards the Nirankari Convention. In the ensuing violence, several people were killed: two of Bhindranwale's followers, eleven members of the Akhand Kirtani Jatha and three Nirankaris.
A criminal case was filed against 62 Nirankaris who were charged by the Akali-led government in Punjab with the murder of 13 Sikhs. The case was heard in the neighbouring Haryana state, and all the accused were acquitted, on the basis that they acted in self-defence. The Punjab government decided not to appeal the decision. As a result of the Nirankaris receiving positive attention in the media, some orthodox Sikhs claimed this to be a conspiracy to defame the Sikh religion. Bhindranwale increased his rhetoric against the perceived enemies of Sikhs. A letter of authority was issued by Akal Takht to ostracize the Sant Nirankaris and created an environment where some of his followers felt justified to kill the perceived enemies of Sikhism. The chief proponents of this attitude were the Babbar Khalsa founded by the widow, Bibi Amarjit Kaur of the Akhand Kirtani Jatha; the Damdami Taksal led by Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, who had also been in Amritsar on the day of the attack on the convention; the Dal Khalsa, formed with the object of demanding a sovereign Sikh state; and the All India Sikh Students Federation, which was banned by the government.
The founders of this Panthan group (sect) in Vancouver vowed to avenge the deaths of Sikhs. Talwinder Singh Parmar led the militant wing of AKJ, which became the Babbar Khalsa, to attack the Nirankaris. On 24 April 1980 Gurbachan Singh, the Baba (head) of the Nirankaris, was killed. A member of the Akhand Kirtani Jatha, Ranjit Singh, surrendered and admitted to the assassination three years later, and was sentenced to serve thirteen years at the Tihar Jail in Delhi.
On 19 November 1981, Parmar was among the alleged militants who escaped from a shootout in which two Punjab Police officers were gunned down outside the house of Amarjit Singh Nihang in Ludhiana district. This added to the notoriety of Babbar Khalsa and its leader. He went to Canada. In 1982, India issued a warrant for Parmar's arrest for six charges of murder, stemming from the killing of the police officers. India notified Canada that Parmar was a wanted militant in 1981 and asked for his extradition in 1982. Canada denied the request in July 1982.
After an Interpol alert, Parmar was arrested while attempting to enter West Germany. West Germany chose to handle the case locally rather than transfer him over to India. Parmar went on a hunger strike to win his religious right to wear a turban and have vegetarian meals in the Düsseldorf jail. After India received information that Parmar had made assassination threats against Indira Gandhi, they found that Germany had decided that the evidence was weak.
In 1983, rebels led by Damdami Taksal Jathedar (leader) Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale occupied Akal Takht of Golden Temple and amassed weapons in the Sikh temple. They passed the Anandpur Sahib Resolution, which demanded that the state be given more powers from the Central government, and greater autonomy, by changes to the Indian constitution. The total number of deaths was 410 in violent incidents and riots while 1,180 people were injured. The Central government rejected the secessionist demands and on 3–6 June 1984, Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi ordered Operation Blue Star, to remove the militants from the Golden Temple in which thousands of Sikhs were injured and killed as the Indian Army attacked the Golden Temple complex to remove Bhindrawale and his followers. Sikhs protested against the operation worldwide. On 31 October 1984, Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two of her Sikh bodyguards. In retaliation, the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, guided by certain Indian National Congress members, killed thousands of Sikhs in India.
Preparation
Parmar visited Inderjit Singh Reyat, a car mechanic and electrician who lived in Duncan, British Columbia, a small community north of Victoria on Vancouver Island. He asked him to construct a bomb; Reyat later claimed he had no idea for what it would be used. Reyat asked various people in the community about dynamite, saying he wanted to remove tree stumps on his property. Reyat also discussed explosives with a co-worker, while expressing anger at the Indian government and Indira Gandhi in particular.
Later that year, Ajaib Singh Bagri accompanied Parmar as his right-hand man in the militancy against the Indian government. Bagri worked as a forklift driver at a sawmill near the town of Kamloops. He was known as a powerful preacher in the Indo-Canadian community. The pair travelled across Canada to incite Sikhs against the Indian government for conducting Operation Blue Star. They used the meetings as fundraisers for Babbar Khalsa. A former head priest in Hamilton testified that Bagri said, "The Indian Government is our enemy, the same way the Hindu society is our enemy." Bagri told a congregation, "Get your weapons ready so we can take revenge against the Indian Government".
Plot preparations
In late 1984, at least two informers reported to authorities on the first abortive plot to bomb Air India Flight 182, which then flew out of Montreal's Mirabel International Airport. In August 1984, the known criminal Gerry Boudreault claimed that Talwinder Parmar showed him a suitcase stuffed with US$200,000 (~$523,670 in 2025) payment if he would plant a bomb on a plane. He decided, "I had done some bad things in my time, done my time in jail, but putting a bomb on a plane ... not me. I went to the police." In September, in an attempt to get his sentence for theft and fraud reduced, Harmail Singh Grewal of Vancouver told the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) of the plot to bomb the flight from Montreal. Both reports were dismissed as unreliable. In June 1985, Paul Besso, an RCMP informant, claimed he had recorded Sikh militants on Vancouver Island discussing plans to bomb an Air India flight. Using an RCMP provided "body pack" and his wired van, Besso intended to record Sikh drug dealers but quickly realized they were militants. Besso claimed during a CBC interview that the entire meeting was recorded by Besso and provided to the RCMP a week before the bombing happened, with transcripts even stating that Air India was the target for the Sikh militants.
The moderate Sikh Ujjal Dosanjh had spoken out against violence by Sikh extremists. He was then injured in February 1985 by an assailant wielding an iron bar. His skull was broken severely and he required 80 stitches in his head. On 5 March 1985, three months before the bombing, the CSIS obtained a court order to place Parmar under surveillance for one year. Although the Babbar Khalsa had not yet been officially banned, the affidavit for surveillance stated, it "is a Sikh terrorist group now established in Canada", it "has claimed responsibility for more than forty assassinations of moderate Sikhs and other persons in the Punjab," and "penned its name to threatening letters [addressed to] ... high officials in India". The affidavit said that on 15 July 1984, Parmar urged the Coach Temple congregation of Calgary, Alberta, to "unite, fight and kill" to avenge the attack on the Golden Temple.
Explosives and clocks
In April 1985, a Canadian man familiar with explosives was asked by Reyat how much dynamite it would take to blow up a tree stump. Reyat asked numerous people in Duncan about explosives, and expressed the need for revenge. Reyat sought cases of dynamite and appeared willing to pay three times the normal price. He eventually confided to one acquaintance that it was not about stumps, but "trouble in the old country", that he needed "explosives to help my countrymen." One friend declined to get him dynamite, but did lend him a 400-page manual on mining with explosives.
On 8 May 1985, Reyat bought a Micronta digital automobile clock at the RadioShack store in Duncan. Designed for a 12-volt automobile electrical system, it could also be powered by a 12-volt lantern battery. The 24-hour alarm activated a buzzer. Reyat returned to the store a week later to buy an electrical relay, after asking how to get the buzzer signal to power another device. Wiretappers recorded nine telephone calls in one month between Reyat and Parmar's residence in Vancouver; Reyat called either from his residence or workplace on Vancouver Island. As a result of this activity, the government added Reyat to the list of persons being monitored for militant activities. The Canadian government would later accuse Reyat of lying in 2003, when at first he said he did not know for what the three clocks he had bought could be used. He later said Parmar needed an explosive device to blow up a bridge or something large in India, and that he needed timers for an explosive device. The relay could be used to trigger the detonator circuit for a blasting cap, which would provide the initial shock needed to detonate larger explosives, such as dynamite.
Reyat later visited a television repair shop, seeking help for a partially disassembled car clock wired to a lantern battery. He claimed that he needed help so that the buzzer stayed on rather than intermittently beeping, so that it would turn on a light in his camper to wake him up. The repairman knew Reyat did not own a camper. Justice J. Raymond Paris said at Reyat's 1991 trial that this was an odd use for a timer.
Bomb tests
By mid-May, Reyat had gone into the woods to test a device with a 12-volt battery, cardboard cylinder, gunpowder, and some dynamite, but the device failed to work. The wooded area was in proximity to Duncan and Paldi. Later, Reyat acquired between six and eight sticks of dynamite "to blow up unidentified stumps if need be in the future" from a Duncan well driller after visiting his house to fix a truck. He also obtained a few blasting caps days later. On 31 May 1985, Reyat brought his timer, attached to a boombox, into his shop so that his fellow employee at Duncan Auto Marine Electric could help him fix it for a friend, but he returned the radio after it did not work properly.