Harjit Singh Sajjan PC OMM MSM CD MP (/ˈhɑːrdʒiːt ˈsɪŋ ˈsædʒən/, HAR-jeet SING SAJ-ən; born September 6, 1970) is a Canadian politician who has served as the minister of emergency preparedness and the president of the Privy Council since July 26, 2023.

In 2021, he was censured by vote in the House of Commons for his claims about Operation Medusa, as well as his handling of the issue of sexual assault within the Canadian Armed Forces.

In 2024, Sajjan came under criticism for prioritizing the evacuation of Sikhs with no links to Canada during the 2021 fall of Kabul, as well as for requesting troops to appear as backdrop to a pop concert by a Punjabi singer.

[5][9] While the family was getting established in their new life in Canada, his mother worked on berry farms in BC Lower Mainland during the summer where Sajjan and his sister would frequently join her.

[9][11] Sajjan's first deployment to Afghanistan was shortly before the start of Operation Medusa in 2006, during which he took leave from his work in the Vancouver Police Department's gang squad.

[9][13][14] Sajjan was mentioned in dispatches for the usefulness of his tactical counterinsurgency knowledge in the planning and implementation of an unnamed operation in September 2006 to secure important terrain.

[15] Upon his return, Sajjan left his position with the Vancouver police, but stayed as a reservist and started his own consulting business that taught intelligence gathering techniques to Canadian and American military personnel.

[27] Harjit Sajjan also has faced allegations from New Democratic Party (NDP) that he is "playing down his connections to the detainee controversy during the [Afghanistan] combat mission [Medusa], where Canadians handed over prisoners to torture by Afghan authorities.

"[28] In September 2019, Sajjan attended an event that was held to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, for which he was subsequently criticized by the Conservatives.

[31] In an April 2017 public speech in New Delhi, Sajjan called himself "the architect" of Operation Medusa, a September 2006 Canadian offensive to remove Taliban fighters from around Kandahar.

[15] In July 2015, Sajjan had made the same claim during an episode of the BC program Conversations That Matter, stating that General Jonathan Vance, the chief of the defence staff at the time the story broke in 2017, saw him as "the architect" in the 2006 offensive.

[34] One of the anonymous officers cited in the National Post, which first broke the story, called Sajjan's statement "a bald-faced lie", while others praised him on a personal level and for his expert intelligence work, but found his claim "really, quite outrageous" because the planning for Operation Medusa was collaborative.

Sajjan also acknowledged that describing himself as "the architect" was a mistake, and highlighted the role of Brigadier-General David Fraser in leading the team that planned the operation.

[47] In 2024, The Globe and Mail reported that, as Defense Minister, Sajjan instructed Canadian special forces to rescue about 225 Afghan Sikhs during the 2021 evacuation of Kabul.

However, General Wayne Eyre, the Chief of the Defence Staff, told the media that the military was following "legal orders" when it attempted the rescue of the Sikhs.

as Minister of International Development, Sajjan requested 100 soldiers to act as backdrops for a pop concert by Punjabi musician Diljit Dosanjh.