The Pulse | Security | South Asia

India’s Organized Crime is No Longer Merely an Indian Problem

An Indian organized crime syndicate led by Lawrence Bishnoi is being treated as a transnational security threat requiring coordinated international action.

When U.S. federal agents simultaneously arrested suspects across California, Indiana, Georgia, Canada and Spain under “Operation Hard Ball,” the target was not a Mexican cartel, the Italian mafia or a Chinese triad. At the center of the sweeping international operation was an Indian gangster lodged in prison thousands of miles away.

The United States unsealed indictments against Lawrence Bishnoi and more than three dozen associates, accusing them of directing an international network involved in extortion, drug trafficking, firearms smuggling and contract killings. Almost simultaneously, Canada designated the Bishnoi Gang a terrorist entity, citing its campaign of violence, intimidation and extortion targeting the South Asian diaspora.

The coordinated action marks a watershed. For perhaps the first time, an Indian organized crime syndicate is being treated by Western governments not merely as a criminal enterprise but as a transnational security threat requiring coordinated international action.

That development carries consequences extending far beyond the fate of one gangster.

For years, Bishnoi was largely viewed in India as another Punjab-based criminal who had expanded into extortion and contract killings. His name became nationally familiar after the murder of Punjabi singer Sidhu Moose Wala, repeated threats against Bollywood superstar Salman Khan, and the killing of former Maharashtra minister Baba Siddique. Yet these crimes, dramatic as they were, obscured a much larger transformation taking place beneath the surface.

According to U.S. and Canadian investigators, the Bishnoi syndicate evolved into a sophisticated international criminal enterprise stretching from India to Canada, the U.S., Britain, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Prosecutors allege it extorted members of the Indian diaspora, smuggled narcotics and firearms through North American trucking routes, laundered money and organized targeted killings while recruiting operatives across several countries.

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the investigation is not its geographical reach but its command structure.

Bishnoi has been in Indian custody since 2015. Yet, American investigators say he continued directing criminal operations from prison using smuggled mobile phones, encrypted messaging applications and trusted intermediaries. These allegations raise uncomfortable questions about India’s prison administration, policing and intelligence systems.

How does an inmate serving time in a high-security prison acquire the ability to supervise an international organization spanning multiple continents?

The question becomes even more troubling when viewed against the scale of the charges. U.S. prosecutors say the syndicate coordinated extortion, drug trafficking, firearms smuggling, money laundering and contract killings. Canadian authorities accuse it of threatening police, demanding “protection taxes” from South Asian business owners and retaliating with shootings against those refusing to pay.

Such operations require logistics, financial networks, international couriers and constant communications — not the capabilities normally associated with someone behind bars.

The investigation also carries important diplomatic implications.

One indictment accuses Bishnoi and his close associate Goldy Brar of orchestrating the 2023 assassination of Sikh separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia,........

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