Immigration consultant fined, sentenced to house arrest in ‘religious work’ scam

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This article was published 03/10/2024 (395 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Winnipeg immigration consultant has been sentenced to two years house arrest and fined $50,000 after admitting to fabricating jobs for clients at a place of worship that didn’t exist.

Balkaran Singh, 45, pleaded guilty Wednesday to one count of violating the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. Court heard Singh took advantage of a federal government provision exempting foreign religious workers from being subject to a labour market impact assessment.

“Many Manitobans would be appalled to know that our support of people with different faiths was used as an immigration loophole,” Crown prosecutor Matt Sinclair told provincial court Judge Catherine Carlson.

Singh caught the attention of Canada Border Service Agency agents in January 2021 when he took three foreign nationals to the Emerson border crossing to fill out permit applications for purported “religious work” with the Dukh Niwaren Sewa Society, a non-profit that listed Singh as its director, Sinclair said.

An agent refused the work permits and referred the matter to the border service’s investigation unit, which commenced “an in-depth, documentation-heavy investigation” of Singh’s immigration practice and non-profit organization, Sinclair said.

An investigation found Singh had purchased a Pine Ridge area residential property in December 2020 and listed it as a gurudwara, a Sikh place of worship.

After the work permits of the three foreign nationals were refused, the Dukh Niwaren Sewa Society opened three volunteer positions for “religious work” at the gurudwara, Sinclair said. Sometime later, the Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada agency approved visitor permits for seven additional paid positions at the gurudwara.

Border service investigators executed a search warrant at the Pine Ridge property and found it was being used as a residential rental property, not a place of worship. Investigators interviewed a female resident, “who confirmed there was no religious work taking place whatsoever,” Sinclair said.

Investigators executed search warrants at Singh’s home and business office and seized altered or fabricated bank statements that had been provided to the Manitoba Provincial Nominee Program in support of Singh’s clients’ immigration applications.

Investigators interviewed several clients who said Singh provided them with pay stubs for jobs that never existed and letters detailing fabricated work experience.

“In light of this information, all but one of these individuals is having their status in Canada reviewed by the CBSA,” Sinclair said.

Court heard Singh immigrated to Canada from India in 2016 and became an immigration consultant three years later.

Defence lawyer Deep Singh Kahlon said his client had a tumultuous upbringing marked by domestic violence and forced child labour. He said the father of two is the sole breadwinner for his family and also supports family members in India.

“I think the lure of making some money clouded his judgment and the seriousness of what his actions were,” Kahlon said.

The maximum sentence for Singh’s crime is five years in prison and/or a $100,000 fine. Crown and defence lawyers jointly recommended Singh be allowed to serve a conditional sentence in the community, arguing it would allow him to continue working and supporting his family.

Carlson, who ordered that Singh also complete 200 hours of community-service work, said his actions not only hurt himself and his family, but his clients, as well.

“He has impacted the lives of several individuals who trusted him to assist them in coming to Canada and starting a new life… (and) has created a pall over some of these programs that rely on immigration consultants to be truthful and trustworthy in submitting documents.”

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca

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