Canada has reaffirmed its support for a united India as efforts get underway in several Canadian cities to hold polls as part of a part of a worldwide referendum for an independent Sikh nation called Khalistan.

A US-based group Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), with chapters in the U.K. and in Canada, said the campaign aims to gauge the will of the Punjabi people all over the world with regards to reestablishing Punjab as a nation state.

“Punjab Referendum 2020 is a campaign to liberate Punjab, currently occupied by India…Once we establish consensus on the question of independence, we will then present the case to the United Nations for reestablishing the country of Punjab,” states the group’s campaign website called referendum2020.org.

Sikhs For Justice (SFJ) is targeting Sikh communities and temples in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver to join some 100 cities worldwide to build consensus for a separate state of Khalistan.

Pockets of pro-Khalistan support are growing in Canada’s Indo-Canadian community, after years of dormancy, Indian intelligence agencies have claimed, prompting India to express its concerns directly to the Justin Trudeau administration.

Reports in India have also linked Canadian Sikhs directly with terror activities in India and their alleged connections to Pakistani militant groups.

Earlier this year, an Indian diplomat told the United Nations Human Rights Council that Canada needed to prevent people from misusing their right to freedom of expression to “incite violence and glorify terrorists as martyrs.”

The Indian Ministry of External Affairs described the campaign as “a separatist activity which impinges on India’s territorial integrity” and “seeks to propagate violence, secessionism, and hatred.”

According to The Times of India, Indian intelligence officials had identified the Pakistani military officer who they believed to be one of the masterminds of the Referendum 2020 campaign.

The news outlet also reported that it traced documents published on the SFJ website back to a Pakistani website and that the two sites were hosted by the same virtual server.

SFJ denies any links with Pakistani intelligence or involvement in violence.

“We are for a ballot, not for a bullet,” Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, SFJ’s legal adviser told Global News.

He said his group is indifferent to how the Canadian and Indian governments view the referendum.

“This referendum is not for the political leaders, this is for the Punjabi community…The [Indian Prime Minister] Narendra Modi government or the Canadian government can agree or not, but we have a right to voice our concerns. We have a right to ask for our rights to self-determination.”

“If Scotland can have a referendum to stay with Britain or not, why can’t we have one for Punjab?,” said Pannun.

Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland’s office said the Liberal government would not recognize any such referendum.

In a statement, Freeland’s office sought to strike a balance between supporting Canadians’ right to expression and respecting the sovereignty of a country with whom relations were strained following Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s troubled state visit there in February.

“Canada’s position on a united India has not changed and our government would not recognize such a referendum…Canadians have the right to freedom of expression and speech. Canadians have the right to peacefully express their views.”

Former Defence Minister of Canada and leader of opposition United Conservative Party Jason Kenney, who was in India last week said Canada supports a united India.

“It does not support this or any other separatist movement. It regards India as a magnificent example of unity in diversity, of successful pluralism,” he said.

Nadir Patel, Canada’s High Commissioner to India, who recently visited the Golden Temple, Sikhism’s holiest shrine, said Canada can’t crush the freedom of expression of its citizens.

He also stated that the Canadian government will continue to support the idea of united India and will cooperate with the Indian agencies.

Pannun said the Khalistan campaign is justified because it seeks simply to re-establish a state that existed from 1799 to 1849 when it was annexed by the British.

“The political leaders in Canada should side with the law, they should side with UN conventions which give all people the right to self-determination,” he said.

“Us Sikhs qualify. We were a country before we were annexed by the British in 1849, and we just want to re-establish — per UN norms — our own independent country.”

Another reason why Sikhs should support the move to establish Khalistan, according to SFJ is the Anand marriage act that is still not applied on Sikhs, who are still forced to marry under Hindu marriage act.

Sikhs For Justice now plans to take its “Punjab Referendum 2020” campaign to Pakistan next year and make a series of announcements about how it will be executed.

Pannun said the next major referendum-related event will be held at Nankana Sahib in Pakistan’s Punjab province, at the gurdwara dedicated to Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh religion who was born there.

The event is being scheduled to coincide with celebrations of the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak and is expected to attract tens of thousands of devotees from around the world to the site.

Pannun said the SFJ also plans to launch the process of registering volunteers for ‘Team Referendum 2020’ at Nankana Sahib. These volunteers will be expected to “guide voting” in countries.

Shuvaloy Majumdar, a senior fellow with Ottawa-based Macdonald-Laurier Institute, said the SFJ’s event was “clearly designed” to provoke India.

Meanwhile, in a blow to the aspirations of Khalistan supporters, President Donald Trump’s administration has declared the Babbar Khalsa International as a “risk to the US personnel and interests overseas”.

The National Strategy for Counterterrorism unveiled in Washington said that Babbar Khalsa International “is responsible for significant terrorist attacks in India and elsewhere that have claimed the lives of innocent civilians”.

The US State and Treasury Departments had listed the Babbar Khalsa International and the International Sikh Youth Federation as terrorist organizations in 2002.

Babbar Khalsa International was founded by a Canadian citizen and was based in Vancouver.

It has been linked to the bombing of Air India Flight 182 in 1981 that killed 329 people on the Emperor Kanishka, a Boeing 747 airliner.