Canada deports Quebec family to India after denying asylum claim

A family of four was deported from Canada to India on Sept. 7 after immigration authorities rejected their asylum claim and a follow-up request to remain on humanitarian grounds, according to the family and an advocacy group that had campaigned against their removal.

Harish Kumar, his wife, Sonika Kumar, and their two sons, Japesh, 14, and Gouresh, 12, had lived in Quebec since arriving on a visitor visa in April 2018, when Harish Kumar filed for refugee protection. The Canada Border Services Agency, the federal agency that enforces immigration law and carries out removals, said the family’s deportation followed the exhaustion of the legal avenues available to challenge a removal order.

The Immigrant Workers Centre, a Montreal-based advocacy group that organized a public campaign on the family’s behalf, said Harish Kumar had worked as a truck driver since 2019, including during the COVID-19 pandemic. The group’s organizer, Mostafa Henaway, said the deportation was unjust given the family’s years of work and tax contributions in Canada.

Canadian authorities rejected the family’s refugee claim on the grounds that they did not accept Harish Kumar’s account of a threat to his life in India. A subsequent application to remain in Canada on humanitarian and compassionate grounds was also denied, according to family members.

The basis for the asylum claim

Harish Kumar, a resident of Goraya in India’s Jalandhar district in Punjab state, said he had run a grocery store in Punjab and that police, acting under pressure from a political figure, filed false cases against him. He said he was detained between Aug. 12 and Aug. 19, 2017, and mistreated in custody, which he said left him fearing for his life. The Immigrant Workers Centre gave a broadly similar account, saying Harish Kumar had refused to give money to people linked to political groups and was later arrested by police, prompting him to go into hiding before fleeing India with his family.

Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Board, the tribunal that hears refugee claims, and immigration officials did not accept the alleged threat as grounds for protection, according to the Canada Border Services Agency and family members. It could not be independently confirmed what specific findings led adjudicators to reject the claim, as the board’s decision has not been made public.

Response from Canadian authorities

The Canada Border Services Agency said in a statement issued after the family’s removal that a decision to deport someone “is not taken lightly.” The agency said removal orders include several steps intended to ensure procedural fairness, and that it proceeds with a removal only once all legal avenues — including appeals to the refugee board, applications for judicial review at Federal Court, and pre-removal risk assessments — have been exhausted. It said it has a legal obligation to carry out an enforceable removal order as soon as possible.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, the federal department responsible for asylum decisions, did not respond to a request for comment, according to CTV News.

The family said Canadian authorities notified them on Aug. 4 that their asylum claim had been denied and that they would need to leave the country by Sept. 7. Harish Kumar said his wife was taken into custody by the Canada Border Services Agency in the days before the family’s removal. A separate account published in India’s Tribune newspaper, citing the family, said they were told on Sept. 4 that removal would take place three days later; the discrepancy in the notification date could not be resolved.

For the couple’s sons, both of whom attended school in Quebec, the news came as a shock. Japesh Kumar, who was six when the family arrived in Canada, said he had grown up in the country and that his friends were there, adding that he had little connection to India. His younger brother said he had few clear memories of India, having been four years old when the family left.

Background

The family’s case unfolded amid a sharp rise in deportations from Canada, and from Quebec in particular. Canada Border Services Agency data show that Quebec accounted for just over half of the country’s removals in the first six months of 2026, up from about 30 percent in 2022, according to figures cited by the legal-affairs publication JURIST and attributed to immigration researcher Louis-Philippe Jannard of the advocacy group TCRI. The agency carried out 23,160 removals in 2025, the highest annual total in its history, according to the same reporting.

Indian nationals have become the largest single nationality among those removed from Canada in 2026, a shift from prior years when Mexican nationals topped the list. Agency data cited by India’s Press Trust of India showed 3,323 Indian nationals were removed in the first half of 2026, nearly matching the 3,779 removed in all of 2025, with 7,669 more Indian nationals listed in the agency’s removal-in-progress inventory as of the end of June.

What follows

The Kumar family’s removal is final; unlike a stay of deportation, which temporarily halts a removal pending further review, no legal process was reported to be underway that could reverse the family’s return to India. It is not known what steps, if any, the family plans to take from India, or whether they intend to pursue further immigration applications. The Immigrant Workers Centre said its campaign did not prevent the family’s removal but had drawn public attention to the case.

Sources

Facts on the family’s history, the asylum claim and the deportation timeline are drawn primarily from CTV News’ direct reporting, with corroborating and additional detail from India’s Tribune newspaper and the Immigrant Workers Centre. Statistical context on Canada’s deportation trends is drawn from JURIST, Business Standard/Press Trust of India and VisaVerge, citing Canada Border Services Agency data.

Wire services and international press

• CTV News, “Quebec family forced to move back to India after 8 years.” ctvnews.ca

Local press (proceedings and family accounts)

• The Tribune, “Canada deports Punjabi family after eight years amid rejected asylum and humanitarian plea.” tribuneindia.com
• Immigrant Workers Centre, “When Canada Needed Harish, He Was ‘Essential.’ When He Asked for Safety, He Became Deportable.” iwc-cti.ca

Background and prior proceedings

• JURIST, “Canada’s Deportation Machine Is Punishing the Wrong People” (August 2026). jurist.org
• Business Standard, “Canada’s Indian deportations hit record: 3,323 removed in 6 months” (Aug. 10, 2026). business-standard.com

Editor’s note on sourcing The notification date the family received before removal is reported differently by CTV News (Aug. 4) and The Tribune (Sept. 4); both versions are noted above because the discrepancy could not be independently resolved. The younger son’s name is rendered as “Gouresh” by CTV News and as “Goulash”/”Gaulash” in other accounts; this article uses the CTV spelling, drawn from a direct interview with the family. The specific findings underlying the Immigration and Refugee Board’s rejection of the asylum claim have not been made public and are not independently confirmed.