Navneet Kaur is only 23 years old, but now, she has suddenly had to assume the role of mother to her two younger brothers and sister after their mother, 43-year-old Davinder Kaur, was fatally stabbed on May 19th in Sparrow Park in Brampton.
The children’s 44-year-old father Nav Nishan Singh has been charged with first-degree murder.
“We never thought this could happen,” Navneet said, with tears running down her face, sitting in the backyard of her uncle’s home, just blocks from the park where her mother was found bleeding and gasping for air.
Navneet, who described her mother as a hardworking role model, said her mother came to Canada to join her in 2018 but returned to India for a year to become a chef. She came back to Canada in 2019.
Stranded in Brampton due to COVID, she says Davinder never returned to India.
Instead, Davinder’s husband, the children’s father, came to Canada last November on a visitor’s visa with Navneet’s two younger brothers, aged 16 and 18, to reunite the family. Her 20-year-old sister remained in India where she continues to study.
But Navneet says her father seemed different. She says he drank a lot, argued with her mother and at times, he made death threats. “He was making threats to kill me and my brother and my mom, but like, we don’t think he was actually do that thing,” she said. She said her mother used to tell her dad she would call police but she never did.
Finally, after just a couple of months in Canada, Navneet said her father walked out, leaving Davinder and her three children to live alone, in their basement apartment near Sparrow Park.
“He told my mom he cannot take the responsibility for the children, so he went. He leave home. So we don’t know where he was living. He don’t give his address. He blocked me and my brother,” Navneet said, explaining that her father continued to talk to her 16-year-old brother.
Around 5:00 p.m. on the afternoon of May 19th, Navneet said Davinder returned from work at the Indian Sweet Master Restaurant where she worked as a cook and received a call from her estranged husband. She said her mom called her and asked for advice whether or not she should go meet him because he had called saying he wanted to sort things out between then.
“I asked her not to go,” Navneet said. But a short time later, she learned that her 18-year-old brother had gone looking for her mother when she failed to return home.
“He told me that mom was in her hand and he trying to save her, trying to keep her from the water,” because her mother was found in a creek near the park.
Navneet also received a video from her uncle, that he said he’d received from Navneet’s father.
“I think my dad took the video. He sent it to my uncle — I call him uncle; he’s my mom’s friend — and he (Singh) sent it to him,” Navneet explained.
The cellphone video which went later went viral on social media showed a woman bleeding on the banks of a creek, while a man’s voice can be heard yelling in Punjabi. Global News translated words from the video to the effect of, “You said you’d call the police on me, where are they now?”
Navneet said she watched about half of it but couldn’t watch anymore.
“It’s horrible, like I even saw, I don’t have the courage to see the video again. He blocked me which is why maybe he didn’t send it to me, but he sent it to so many people,” she explained.
Navneet said she messaged a number of people to take it down, and while some did, others have not.
Peel Regional Police have confirmed to Global News that they are aware of a video being circulated related to a homicide investigation that occurred on Friday, May 19th.
“We have and continue to work with social media platforms to ensure that this video is removed and this matter is resolved as quickly as possible,” said Const. Sarah Patton in a statement to Global News.
Navneet has now started a GoFundMe to raise money for her mother’s funeral, but said the service will not be held until her 20-year-old sister can come to Canada from India, adding the Canadian consulate is helping her sister get an expedited visitor visa to come.
Her brothers are also here as visitors studying in high school and she is hopeful they can help them get permanent resident status so they don’t have to return home.
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