[16] In India on 13 April 1978 a convention organised by the Sant Nirankari Mission took place at the time of the important Sikh festival of Vaisakhi, a celebration of the birth of Khalsa.

[17] 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.

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.

[23][24] On 19 November 1981, Parmar was among the alleged terrorists who escaped from a shootout in which two Punjab Police officers were gunned down outside the house of Amarjit Singh Nihang in Ludhiana district.

[33] 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.

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.

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.

[39] The next day, Reyat purchased a large Sanyo component tuner, model FMT 611 K, at Woolworths, and left his name and telephone number on the charge slip, which was later found in a search of his home.

Study of debris from the Narita explosion would eventually show the bomb had been housed inside a Sanyo tuner with a serial number matching a model sold only in British Columbia, and used a Micronta clock as a timer, which powered a relay with an Eveready 12-volt battery to trigger blasting caps to set off a high explosive consistent with sticks of dynamite,[43] all matching items purchased by Reyat.

[48] On 9 June 1985, a police informer in Hamilton reported that Parmar and Bagri had visited the Malton Sikh Temple, warning the faithful that "it would be unsafe" to fly Air India.

Phone records show he called Johal at 7:17 p.m. A witness whose name was protected testified that Bagri asked to borrow her car the night before the bombing to take some suitcases to the airport, though he would not be flying with them.

Reyat was seen in the company of another East Indian man at the Auto Marine Electric store in Burnaby, near Parmar's house, between 10:00 a.m. and 11:30 a.m.[citation needed] He bought two 12 volt batteries similar to the one used in the explosive device tested in the woods, and they were to fit into a special metal bracket he had brought with him.

An Air India security officer had demonstrated that it made a loud scream when a lit match was held an inch away, and showed that it should be used around the edge of the bag being tested.

[66] At 07:09:58 GMT (8:09:58 a.m. Irish time), the crew of the Boeing 747 "squawked 2005"[73] (a routine activation of its aviation transponder) as requested by Shannon Airport Air Traffic Control (ATC), then disappeared from the radar screens five minutes later.

"[80]Two of these drowning victims, a pregnant woman in her second trimester and her unborn son, were described by John Hogan in testimony given at a coroner's inquest convened in Cork on 17 September 1985: "The other significant findings were large amounts of frothy fluid in her mouth and nostrils, and all of the air passages and the lungs were water-logged and extremely heavy.

[86] Notable passengers and crew included Inder Thakur, an Air India purser and former actor along with his wife and son; and Yelavarthy Nayudamma, a scientist and chemical engineer.

[68]: 33 Within hours, Canada's Indian community was a focus of attention as victims and among hints that officials were investigating connections to the Sikh separatists who had threatened and committed acts of violence in retaliation against Hindus.

The RCMP assigned no less than 135 officers to check every store that could have sold Sanyo tuners, leading to the discovery of a recent sale to mechanic Inderjit Singh Reyat in his hometown of Duncan, British Columbia.

[68] Based on observations, wiretaps, searches and arrests of persons believed to be participants, the bombing was determined to be the joint project of at least two Sikh terrorist groups with extensive membership in Canada, the United States, Britain and India.

Authorities initially lacked evidence to link Inderjit Singh Reyat directly to either the Narita or Air India blasts and pursue a conspiracy to commit murder charge.

[119] Mounties working with prosecutor Jardine and RCMP and Japanese experts eventually determined the components of the bomb from fragments and matched them with items that Reyat possessed or had purchased.

Even the most sympathetic of listeners could only conclude, as do I, that his evidence was patently and pathetically fabricated in an attempt to minimise his involvement in his crime to an extreme degree, while refusing to reveal relevant information he clearly possesses.

"[137][138] In February 2011, Reyat filed an appeal stating that the judge "erred in law, misdirected the jury and failed to tell jurors there was no evidence to support portions of the Crown's closing address," and called it "harsh and excessive," asking for a new trial.

Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario James Bartleman also testified that, as a senior intelligence official in the federal Department of External Affairs, he saw a security "intercept" with a specific warning of a threat against the airline on the weekend of the bombing.

''[144] Tara Singh Hayer, the publisher of the Indo-Canadian Times and a member of the Order of British Columbia,[148] provided an affidavit to the RCMP in 1995 claiming that he was present during a conversation in which Bagri admitted his involvement in the bombings.

[138] As per recommendation of the inquiry, Stephen Harper announced in the media, a week after the report and on the 25th anniversary of the disaster, that he would "acknowledge the catastrophic failures of intelligence, policing and air security that led to the bombing, and the prosecutorial lapses that followed" and deliver an apology on behalf of the sitting Cabinet of Canada.

[156] On 23 June 2005, 20 years after the downing of Air India Flight 182, Prime Minister Paul Martin attended a memorial service in Ahakista, West Cork, Ireland, with victims' families to grieve.

[164]Ujjal Dosanjh, the moderate Sikh who had been attacked in a prelude to the Air India bombing, was by this time a member of Martin's cabinet as federal Minister of Health, and had previously in the interim been Premier of British Columbia.

On the morning of July 14, 2022 Ripudaman Singh Malik was shot several times and died outside his family business, Papillon Eastern Imports, on 128 Street in Surrey, British Columbia.

The memorial features a sundial, the base of which consists of stones from all provinces and territories of Canada, as well as the countries of the other victims, and a wall, oriented toward Ireland and bearing the names of the dead.