Punjab, the heartland of the Indian diaspora, has become a dangerous destination for Non-Resident Indians visiting to see family, attend weddings, manage property, or simply reconnect with their roots. Between early 2025 and February 2026, a chilling and well-documented pattern has emerged: overseas Indians from the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia are being systematically targeted by transnational gangster networks for extortion, armed attacks, and in some cases, cold-blooded contract murder. The criminals operate from foreign soil, often from Canada, Pakistan, the UAE, or the UK, using local foot soldiers in Punjab to carry out the actual violence. The logic is ruthless and calculated: NRIs are perceived as wealthy, they visit predictably for festivals and family events, and they are often unfamiliar with the evolving criminal landscape back home. The state has 15 designated NRI Police Stations and a dedicated Anti-Gangster Task Force (AGTF), yet incidents continue to rise. Members of Parliament have raised the matter in Lok Sabha, calling the situation a threat to national security. As one MP grimly put it, NRI families are openly facing threats, and law and order in Punjab is rapidly collapsing.
Who Is Behind the Violence?
The attacks on NRIs are orchestrated predominantly by transnational gangster networks whose bosses sit comfortably abroad while directing murders and extortions from their phones. The most notorious among these are the Lawrence Bishnoi and Goldy Brar syndicate operating from Canada and the UAE, the Shahzad Bhatti gang based in Pakistan, the Jaggu Bhagwanpuria and Amrit Dalam network with members scattered across Europe and North America, the Ghanshampuria and Doni Bal factions based in the UK, and the Anmol Bishnoi and Hari Boxer group operating from the United States and Canada. These gangs use local Punjab-based foot soldiers to carry out physical attacks — firing at houses, planting grenades, or conducting contract killings — while the masterminds issue instructions over encrypted apps from abroad. They target NRIs specifically because diaspora members tend to own more property, carry more cash, and have less day-to-day familiarity with the criminals operating in their villages. They also know that an NRI will not always go to the police for fear of prolonged legal entanglement while abroad.
February 2026 — Khanna, Ludhiana: 86-Year-Old Canadian NRI Woman Murdered
In one of the most heartbreaking incidents of the entire period, Jaspal Kaur, an 86-year-old retired school teacher and permanent resident of Canada, was found murdered at her home in Khanna, Punjab, on February 1, 2026. She had arrived from Canada in October 2025 and was planning to return in April. When her body was discovered, her hands were tied, and her mouth was covered with cloth. The murder sent shockwaves through Punjab’s diaspora community. Police launched a murder investigation, though as of the time of this report, no arrests had been publicly announced. The case became symbolic of the dangers facing elderly NRIs who return to Punjab alone, without local family protection. Just days before their planned arrival in Punjab on February 11, 2026, the home of US-based NRI Kulwant Singh Kanta Sahota in Bara village, Goraya, was attacked by unidentified assailants on motorcycles. The men vandalised the ancestral property in a clear act of intimidation. This was not the first such incident targeting the Sahota family police had previously uncovered a separate conspiracy to attack them. The family made the painful decision to cancel their visit entirely and refused to return to Punjab. A complaint was lodged with Goraya police, and the Chowki Dhuleta incharge confirmed an investigation was underway.
December 2025 — Ludhiana: Jeweller Targeted for Rs 1 Crore Extortion; Police Trap Catches Gunman
In December 2025, a Ludhiana jeweller named Sachin Verma reported that foreign based gangster Amrit Dalam of the Jaggu Bhagwanpuria gang had called threatening to have him killed unless he paid Rs 1 crore. On December 12, another call arrived offering to settle for Rs 10 lakh. Punjab Police worked quickly they set a trap. On December 13, when two of Dalam’s accomplices arrived to collect the money, a gunfight broke out. One accomplice, identified as Rohin Masih, was shot and arrested. The second managed to flee. A case was immediately registered. The incident highlighted how Punjab Police, when forewarned, can intercept gangster collection networks — but also how brazen these networks have become, operating in broad daylight.
November 2025 — Jalandhar: Canadian-US NRI Beaten by Mob
A Canadian and US-naturalised citizen shared a widely-reported account of being physically attacked while visiting Jalandhar. The NRI was photographing the area as a hobby when a group of men confronted him. When he refused to stop, an older man grabbed his phone and restrained his clothing. A mob quickly gathered and turned violent — holding the NRI by the neck and arms and beating him. A policeman reportedly walked by without intervening. The NRI attributed the hostility partly to heightened suspicion of foreigners in the region following recent arrests of Pakistani spies in Jalandhar. The case drew attention to a broader climate of suspicion and danger for diaspora visitors.
October 2025 — Kalanaur, Gurdaspur: Hospital Shot At; Rs 50 Lakh Demanded
Associates of US-based gangster Gurlal Singh, alias Gullu, opened fire at Sri Ram Hospital in Kalanaur on October 15, 2025. The gang demanded Rs 50 lakh from the hospital owner. Gurlal has 13 criminal cases registered against him in Punjab and directs operations from the United States. Police investigating this case under Operation Prahar confirmed that Gurlal is part of a larger overseas network with links to Gurdev Jassal’s criminal gang in the US. The case underscored that even institutions like hospitals are not safe from extortion, and that Punjab’s business community lives under a constant shadow of gang intimidation.
August 2025 — Amritsar: Lawrence Bishnoi Gang Fires Eight Shots at Australia-Based NRI’s Home
Accomplices of the Lawrence Bishnoi gang fired eight shots at the Jaintipur village home of Sukhcharan Singh Bal, an Australia-based NRI, late one night in August 2025. Bal was in Sydney at the time of the attack. He had previously received extortion demands from gang members via WhatsApp. A police patrolling party nearby heard the gunfire and rushed to the scene, but the three attackers fled on a motorcycle. Sukhcharan Bal filed complaints with both Kathunangal Police Station in Punjab and the Australian Police, who also registered the case. An FIR was registered under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Arms Act. This case became one of several examples in 2025 where NRIs absent from India still had their Punjab homes used as targets of gang intimidation.
July 2025 — Pandori, Ludhiana: Rs 5 Crore Extortion; NRI’s House Shot At at 3 AM
In the early hours of July 29, 2025, masked assailants linked to the Lawrence and Anmol Bishnoi gang fired multiple shots at the Pandori village home of NRI Jagmohan Singh, who was in the United States at the time. His wife Amandeep Kaur, their children, and his mother-in-law were inside the house when bullets struck the building. Nobody was physically injured, but within hours of the shooting, gangster Hari Boxer a close associate of Anmol Bishnoi called Jagmohan in the US and demanded Rs 5 crore, threatening that he would be killed if he ever returned to India. Amandeep filed a police complaint. Punjab Police acted swiftly four accused were arrested: Jaswinder Singh alias Ambarsaria, Gaurav Nirwal alias Dadupuria, Kamaljit Singh alias Gandhi, and Narinder Singh. A case was registered and the investigation progressed to tracing the overseas handlers.
July 2025 — Ludhiana: US Citizen (71) Murdered After Romantic Scam, UK NRI Suspect Flees
Perhaps the most internationally publicised crime of 2025 in Punjab was the murder of Rupinder Kaur Pandher, a 71-year-old US citizen from Seattle, who had come to Punjab to marry a UK-based NRI named Charanjit Singh Grewal, whom she had met on a matrimonial website. On the night of July 12–13, Grewal allegedly hired a local contract killer named Sukhjeet Singh, alias Sonu, to murder her. Sonu bludgeoned her with a baseball bat inside a storeroom, then burned her body with diesel fuel, later dumping her skeletal remains in a drain near Lehra village. Rupinder’s sister, Kamal Kaur Khairah, raised the alarm on July 28 after losing contact and alerted the US Embassy in New Delhi. The Embassy applied pressure on Punjab Police to investigate. An FIR was registered at Dehlon Police Station, Ludhiana. Sonu was arrested and confessed. Grewal fled to England and remains absconding, named the prime suspect. The case exposed a dark and growing phenomenon of matrimonial scams targeting NRI women visiting Punjab.
July 2025 — Amritsar: Extortion Module Busted; Overseas NRI Named as Mastermind
On July 21, 2025, the owner of an under-construction banquet hall on the outskirts of Amritsar was fired upon by unknown assailants. He received an extortion call shortly after from a foreign number. The caller invoked the name of gangster Bony Bal as intimidation. Police investigated and arrested four persons including operatives Simaratpal and Amandeep Singh and crucially, an overseas NRI named Sukhdev Singh, who had masterminded the extortion from abroad. A case was registered at Sadar Police Station, Amritsar. This incident was notable as it revealed that in some cases, NRIs themselves can be the perpetrators using diaspora status and foreign phone numbers to orchestrate crime while remaining physically outside India’s jurisdiction.
June 2025 — Jalandhar: NRI Portugal Family’s Home Shot At; Pakistani Gangster Shahzad Bhatti Claims Responsibility
In June 2025, two bike-borne gunmen fired at the residence of a family on Gulab Devi Road, Aman Nagar, Jalandhar. Four sons of the family, including Jatinder Singh, are settled in Portugal. Just three days before the attack, Pakistani gangster Shahzad Bhatti had called the family demanding around Rs 50 lakh. Minutes before the firing, the shooter’s face appeared on the caller ID, and Bhatti himself released the video of the attack online, publicly claiming responsibility. The mother, Charanjit Kaur, confirmed the family had received similar threats the previous year and had reported them to police. Bullets struck the doors and walls of the house; no family members were injured. An FIR was registered under the BNS and the Arms Act. This brazen public claiming of responsibility live-streamed by the gangster himself — marked a new level of intimidation targeting diaspora families.
March 2025 — Jalandhar: Grenade Attack on NRI YouTuber’s Property; Pakistan-Based Network Blamed
In March 2025, Pakistani gangster Shahzad Bhatti orchestrated a grenade attack on the home of YouTuber Rozer Sandhu in Jalandhar. Sandhu, a prominent social media influencer, was targeted in what police described as a combination of extortion, personal dispute, and alleged online remarks. Police confirmed the attack had been coordinated from Pakistan. This was the first of at least three serious attacks in Jalandhar attributed to Bhatti’s network within a four-month window in 2025, establishing him as one of the most active overseas criminal operators targeting Punjab.
March 2025 — Tarn Taran: Police Encounter with Extortion Gangsters
On March 1, 2025, Punjab Police confronted three suspects Arshdeep Singh, Robinpreet Singh, and Karandeep Singh in Khehra village, Tarn Taran. An encounter broke out. Two gangsters, Prakash Singh and Prabhjeet Singh, were shot in the legs and arrested. Police established they had been operating under the instructions of a gangster known as “Gopi Numberdar” and were involved in extortion and NDPS cases. An FIR was registered immediately. Police confirmed the gangsters had been planning further targeted activities in the Khehra area. The encounter demonstrated that Punjab’s AGTF was actively trying to intercept gang operations before attacks could be carried out.
The Scale of Police Cases Registered
The volume of formal police cases registered against NRI-related crimes in Punjab paints a sobering statistical picture. According to data compiled from Punjab Police’s Anti-Gangster Task Force and the state’s NRI Commission, the AGTF alone received 207 extortion complaints in a single eight-month period in 2024, out of which 172 FIRs were registered, 116 cases were traced to their source, and 174 persons were arrested. Since 2022, over 1,000 extortion calls targeting Punjab residents many of them NRIs or NRI-linked business owners have been reported to police. Under Operation Prahar and its successor Operation Prahar-2, Punjab Police rounded up 4,871 associates of 61 overseas-based gangsters, formally arresting 3,256 of them.Punjab has 15 dedicated NRI Police Stations spread across the state, staffed by approximately 343 personnel, with a 24×7 helpline. The Punjab NRI Commission reports that more than 50% of all complaints it receives relate to illegal land grabbing and property disputes a category that frequently overlaps with physical threats and intimidation. The sheer volume of cases illustrates that the incidents reported in the media represent only the most dramatic tip of a very large iceberg.It is also worth noting that the Punjab Police have also registered cases against NRIs themselves in certain instances particularly where overseas-based individuals have been identified as masterminds directing extortion, murder, or property fraud from abroad. In the Amritsar banquet hall case (July 2025) and several Operation Prahar investigations, NRIs living in Canada, the US, and the UK were named accused in Punjab FIRs, with red corner notices and extradition requests being processed in some cases.
The Broader Pattern: Digital Arrests and Matrimonial Fraud
Beyond the gun attacks and extortion calls, 2025–2026 saw a major rise in what Indian law enforcement calls “digital arrest” scams targeting NRIs visiting or connected to Punjab. In one case from late 2025, an Indian-origin woman from the US received a WhatsApp call at 3 AM in which callers posed as law enforcement officials and claimed her bank account was linked to serious crimes. She was kept on video call for days essentially a psychological prisoner and defrauded of a substantial sum. Delhi Police traced the money to M/s Varnav Infotech, a firm registered in SAS Nagar (Mohali), Punjab, revealing the Punjab connection to what appeared to be a Delhi-based crime.The matrimonial scam dimension, exposed most devastatingly by the Rupinder Kaur Pandher murder case, is also emerging as a distinct and disturbing trend. Elderly NRI women, often widows, are being contacted through matrimonial websites by criminals who pose as respectable NRI men, lure them to Punjab under the pretext of marriage, and then rob or, in the worst cases, kill them for property or inheritance.
Why NRIs Are Staying Away
The cumulative effect of these incidents is now measurable in social and economic terms. Multiple families have cancelled planned trips to Punjab. Community organisations in North America and the UK have issued informal advisories. Punjabi diaspora social media groups regularly carry warnings about which areas are currently “active” with gang threats. One US based Punjabi community leader told a national newspaper: “We love Punjab. We want to come back. But we are scared. We tell our elderly parents to stay put.”In Parliament in December 2025, MP Gurjeet Singh Aujla raised the matter in Lok Sabha and demanded that the Union Home Minister form a joint Centre-state task force, declare a security emergency for NRIs visiting Punjab, and order a High Court-monitored judicial inquiry. He stated on record that NRI families are being openly threatened and that gang networks are operating with near-total impunity, some of them even directing operations from inside Punjab jails.
What Is Being Done — And What Isn’t
Punjab Police has not been entirely passive. Operations Prahar and Prahar-2 have achieved significant results on paper thousands of gang associates arrested, dozens of weapons recovered, and several encounters in which shooters were neutralised. India has initiated data-sharing arrangements with Canadian, Australian, and British law enforcement to track cross-border gang finances and communications. The 15 NRI Police Stations provide a dedicated complaint mechanism, and the AGTF has intercepted several planned attacks before they occurred, including the Ludhiana jeweller sting in December 2025.However, critics including the opposition, NRI advocacy groups, and several senior journalists argue that the structural problem remains unsolved. As long as gangster kingpins can operate from Canada, Pakistan, and the UAE with relative impunity, Punjab’s local police can only catch the foot soldiers, not the brains. Extradition treaties remain slow and politically complicated. And for every gang module broken up, new recruits emerge from Punjab’s unemployment-ridden villages, drawn by the promise of easy money from overseas handlers.
Punjab’s NRI community is caught in a painful trap bound by deep emotional attachment to their homeland, yet facing a security environment that grows more dangerous with each passing year. Transnational gangs have weaponised that attachment, knowing that the diaspora will inevitably return for weddings, funerals, harvests, and festivals. They have turned love for Punjab against Punjab’s own people.Until India breaks the overseas gang-to-local shooter pipeline through effective extradition, international financial intelligence, and genuine accountability for police inaction NRI visits to Punjab will remain an act of considerable personal courage. The incidents documented in this report, from the murder of an 86-year-old Canadian grandmother in Khanna to the five-crore extortion demand placed on a man sitting quietly in the United States, tell a single coherent story: Punjab’s NRI diaspora is under siege, and the state has not yet found an adequate answer.
This article is compiled from verified media reports including The Tribune India, Gulf News, ANI, The Quint, The Print, TrueScoop News, Babushahi.com, m9.news, the420.in, and official Punjab Police and government statements. All incidents are sourced and dated to the best available information as of February 2026.