Govind Tekale
A letter attributed to the Bishnoi gang—claiming thousands of members and threatening to “rule in Canada”—has been made public through an Access to Information request connected to an Immigration and Refugee Board proceeding. The document surfaced via CBC News and has prompted coverage from multiple Canadian outlets.
The letter was sent to the Abbotsford Police Department in British Columbia. According to reporting from CBC News and Today in Canada, the letter claimed the gang had approximately 5,000 members and had access to firearms. The language included a claim that the group would exert dominance over Canada.
The letter did not become public because the gang released it voluntarily. It was disclosed through an Access to Information process tied to an Immigration and Refugee Board proceeding—a legal process through which documents entered as exhibits from that proceeding became accessible. That context matters for how the claims in the letter should be read.
The 5,000 figure is a claim made in the letter itself and is not independently verified. Reading a gang’s self-reported membership number as a verified fact is a mistake. The materials cited for this story do not independently establish that 5,000 Bishnoi members operate in Canada. The letter’s claims are evidence of what the gang communicated to police; they are not independent verification of those claims.
What the Bishnoi network is
The Bishnoi gang—also referred to as the Lawrence Bishnoi network—is an organized criminal group with roots in India. The network has been cited in Canadian law-enforcement reporting concerning organized crime and alleged extortion and violence. The Bishnoi network gained wider attention following the murder of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia in 2023, which itself became the center of a diplomatic dispute between Canada and India.
The Abbotsford Police letter is one piece of documented evidence about the gang’s reach and ambitions in Canada, as stated by the gang. Canadian law enforcement agencies have been investigating the group’s presence and operations, but the current public record does not contain independently verified membership counts or a complete picture of the gang’s Canadian infrastructure.
The IRB context is relevant because that board handles refugee hearings and immigration decisions. Documents from IRB proceedings can, in some cases, be accessed through Access to Information requests. The emergence of the Bishnoi letter through this channel means it was already part of a legal proceeding before it became news—a detail that affects how to interpret both its significance and its limitations as evidence.
How many Bishnoi gang members are actually in Canada?
That number has not been independently established. The widely reported figure of 5,000 comes directly from the gang’s own letter to police—a threatening communication. The letter itself does not establish the number and no independent corroboration has been cited. The letter is evidence of what the gang claimed; it is not a verified membership count.
The Bishnoi letter was disclosed through an IRB-related Access to Information process. Further details on the gang’s operations are expected to emerge through ongoing law enforcement and legal proceedings.
