[The Himalayan Voice does not endorse any write-ups containing opinions that call for division and disintegration of an entity or the whole but it offers forum to express grievances and opinions from the people concerned. It believes in debate and discussion. There are some urgent issues in the Himalayan region needing immediate dialogue between the parties concerned. We have below posted, as it was received, a write-up from one of our readers for some serious discussion. Let our readers read and respond to it. - The Blogger]
Dr. Gurmit Singh Aulakh
 |
| The Golden temple in Amritsar |
At that convention, several ideas were discussed to advance the liberation of Khalistan. As you know, organizations such as Dal Khalsa and others have been actively organizing to liberate our homeland. On September 28, Simranjit Singh Mann had a rally in Jagraon in Ludhiana which was attended by over 100,000 people.
Slogans of Khalistan were raised and they openly asked for an independent, sovereign Khalistan. We appreciate and support these efforts but the Council of Khalistan convention felt it was time to take those efforts to a new level.
Slogans of Khalistan were raised and they openly asked for an independent, sovereign Khalistan. We appreciate and support these efforts but the Council of Khalistan convention felt it was time to take those efforts to a new level.
The Sikhs in Punjab have suffered enormous repression at the hands of the Indian regime in the last 26 years. The Indian government has murdered over 250,000 Sikhs since 1984. In addition, over 50,000 Sikh youth were picked up from their houses, tortured, murdered in police custody, and then secretly cremated as “unidentified bodies.” Their remains were never even given to their families! Over 52,000 Sikhs sit in Indian jails as political prisoners without charge or trial, according to a report by the Movement Against State Repression (MASR.) Some of them have been in illegal custody for the last 26 years! Repression and genocide of this magnitude at the hands of the Indian government is unparalleled. India should be ashamed of the genocide it has committed against Sikhs, Christians, Muslims, and other minorities.
History bears out that prediction. The historical record shows that multinational states such as India are doomed to failure. Countries like Austria-Hungary , India ’s longtime friend the Soviet Union , Yugoslavia , Czechoslovakia , and others are the examples that prove this point. Kosovo recently became independent and Montenegro , with less than a million people, is an independent country.
India is not one country; it is a polyglot like those countries, thrown together for the convenience of the British colonialists. It is doomed to break up as they did. Currently, there are 17 freedom movements within India ’s borders. It has 18 official languages. We hope that India ’s breakup will be peaceful like Czechoslovakia ’s, not violent like Yugoslavia ’s. Otherwise, the cost in blood and treasure, not only to the minority nations like Khalistan, Kashmir , Nagalim, and the others, but to Hindu India as well, will be staggering and tragic.
Three former Jathedars of the Akal Takht – Bhai Ranjit Singh, Professor Darshan Singh, and Joginder Singh Vedanti – have publicly endorsed Khalistan. The time for freedom has come.
The time has come to break that chain and put an end to poverty in Punjab . The majority of schools in Punjab do not have teachers. How can the Sikh Nation progress without a good education? The leaders are either incompetent or so selfish that they want to keep the people poor and uneducated to enrich themselves and stay in power through corruption. The time has come for honest, dedicated, capable, educated leaders to get control of government and work for the people, not for themselves.
At this time, the whole Khalsa Panth must be energized to reestablish a sovereign, independent Khalsa Raj by freeing our homeland, Khalistan. It is time for Sikhs to look back at our history of persecution and suffering over the past two decades. The Hindu government of India, whether run by the Congress Party or by the BJP, wants minorities either subservient to Hinduism or completely wiped out.
In spite of the fact that the religions believe completely opposite things, Hindus desire to engulf Sikhism just as they did with Jainism and Buddhism in India. They think that Buddhism is part of Hinduism because Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, was born in India. Similarly, Guru Nanak was born Hindu, so they proclaim Sikhism to be part of Hinduism. Yet Guru Nanak said that he was “neither Hindu nor Muslim.” Jesus was born Jewish. Does that mean that Christianity is merely part of Judaism?
We must bring back our Khalsa spirit. We must remember our heritage and tradition of “Khalsa Bagi Yan Badshah” by committing ourselves to freeing our homeland, Punjab, Khalistan, from Indian occupation. We need a new Sikh political party which has a dedication to the interests of the Sikh Nation as its sole objective, to establish Khalsa Raj by liberating Khalistan, severing all political ties with India.
The time has come for Sikhs in Punjab to begin a Shantmai Morcha to liberate Khalistan. Boycott the Indian regime and protest it whenever and wherever possible. Boycott Indian goods to put a dent in the country's economic power. Disinvest from companies that are invested in India. This tactic worked to help end apartheid in South Africa. There is no reason it should not work against the Indian oppressors. Let us be like a swarm of bees constantly buzzing around the Indian elephant. As he swats at one, many more show up. Eventually, the structure of Indian repression will destroy itself by swat after swat after swat.
The Indian government wants to break the will of the Sikh Nation and enslave them forever, making Sikhism a part of Hinduism. This can only be stopped if we free Punjab from Delhi’s control and reestablish a sovereign, independent country, as declared on October 7, 1987. We must recommit ourselves to freeing our homeland, Punjab, Khalistan.
It is time to take action. In spite of India ’s best efforts, they cannot arrest all of us. Their jails are overflowing as it is. We must keep the pressure on every day to force India to withdraw from our homeland and allow the glow of freedom in Khalistan.
The flame of freedom still burns brightly in Punjab in spite of the Indian government’s brutal repression. Perhaps this is why India is afraid to hold a free and fair vote on the subject of independence. The essence of democracy is the right to self-determination. The time to achieve our independence is now. Always remember our heritage:
Raj Kare Ga Khalsa; Khalsa Bagi Yan Badshah.
Freedom for Khalistan is closer than ever. We must rededicate ourselves to achieving it.
(The author is President of Council of Khalistan, Washington DC, USA )
@ Sulekha
*
[The riots were allegedly stage managed by the Congress legislators. There were reports that the Congress leaders in Delhi competed in terms of achieving more killings in their constituencies probably to impress the then acting Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. It was said that even calls to the then President Giani Zail singh's home by desperate people could not save anyone. The then Home Minister P.V.Narasimha Rao was no way interested in preventing the likes of H.K.L.Bhagat, Jagdish Tytler etc. from going on the killing spree. Even the then home minister P.V.Narasmha Rao could not do anything to stem the rot. If he would have tried any misadventures, the home minister could have been changed overnight.]
When one hears the name Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, the thoughts will of course go back to the Operation Blue Star conducted in 1984. Bhindranwale was one of the main flag bearers of the separate Khalistan movement. He was killed in the Golden Temple in Amritsar when the Indian army marched into the Golden Temple during the reign of the then Indian Prime Minister Late Mrs.Indira Gandhi. Indira Gandhi had no choice that time. Bhindranwale and other terrorists supporting the separate Khalistan movement hid themselves with all the weapons inside the Golden Temple.
When one hears the name Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, the thoughts will of course go back to the Operation Blue Star conducted in 1984. Bhindranwale was one of the main flag bearers of the separate Khalistan movement. He was killed in the Golden Temple in Amritsar when the Indian army marched into the Golden Temple during the reign of the then Indian Prime Minister Late Mrs.Indira Gandhi. Indira Gandhi had no choice that time. Bhindranwale and other terrorists supporting the separate Khalistan movement hid themselves with all the weapons inside the Golden Temple.
The Government thus sent the army into the temple.
Bhindranwale and many other terrorists were killed in the operation. Punjab
continued to burn for at least a decade more. K.P.S Gill was the police officer
who got the credit for crushing the insurgency. But the reason for the
resolution of the Punjab problem was more due to the Sikh community living in
India not being interested in a separate country. But who has funded the
separate Khalistan movement? It is a known fact that the Sikh community staying
abroad particularly in Canada and England actively supported a separate Khalistan
by generating huge amount of funds. The separate Khalistan movement has
consumed the life of the former PM Indira Gandhi whose own body guards have
killed her mercilessly. Indira Gandhi's death triggered riots against the Sikh
community in Delhi when thousands of sikhs lost their lives.
The riots were
allegedly stage managed by the Congress legislators. There were reports that
the Congress leaders in Delhi competed in terms of achieving more killings in
their constituencies probably to impress the then acting Prime Minister Rajiv
Gandhi. It was said that even calls to the then President Giani Zail singh's
home by desperate people could not save anyone. The then Home Minister
P.V.Narasimha Rao was no way interested in preventing the likes of H.K.L.Bhagat,
Jagdish Tytler etc. from going on the killing spree. Even the then home minister
P.V.Narasmha Rao could not do anything to stem the rot. If he would have tried
any misadventures, the home minister could have been changed overnight.
The
control of command shifted in favour of those interested to kill the innocent
people from the Sikh community. May be one of the killer leaders would have
been nominated as the home minister. It was one of the biggest mass murders
ever committed in the independent Indian history. The riots have motivated more
and more Sikh youngsters to join the separate Khalistan movement. There were
lots of post graduates and even some PhDs in the ranks of the terrorists. One
more operation was conducted to capture militants holed inside the Golden
Temple during the Rajiv Gandhi regime. It was called Operation Black Thunder.
This time the police or army has not marched inside the temple. But the police
have surrounded the temple and forced the inmates to surrender as supplies
diminished inside the temple.
Lots
of cold blooded murders happened in the Punjab and surrounding areas for a
decade by using the most sophiscated of the weapons. The AK47 became familiar
in India due to the frequent news reports related to the killings using the
AK47. Those days no one in India even would have dreamt of the Punjab problem
dying. But it was like a dream. The killings subsided and finally there was no
trace of the separate Khalistan movement. All the terrorists who were active in
the movement were either captured or killed in the encounters with the police.
It might be probably the first separatist movement in the world to die down
within a decade after such a violent phase of terrorist activities.
Though the Indian Union had successfully
crushed the movement, some sections of the NRI sikh community in Canada and UK
has probably not dropped the idea of carving out a separate Khalistan. One of
the television channels in India has recently reported that the problem may get
active again quoting the Intelligence Bureau (IB) reports. Many people watching
the TV would have brushed aside the reports. But it did not take much time for
the situation to reach a boiling point. Yes, I mean it. We are approaching a
situation wherein another head on collision is unavoidable for the Indian Union
due to the activities in the Golden temple. It was said that the photo of
Bhindranwale was put up on the walls of the Golden temple. It also seems that
the action has the sanction of the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee
(SGPC) whose members have attended the function in which Bhindranwale's photo
was put up in the temple.
What is the message that the people behind the
action wanted to convey? Should India ignore this action? It was a known fact
that Bhindranwale was behind the formation of so many terrorist groups in
Punjab. The terrorists have killed thousands of innocent people in the country.
What is his greatness that his photo should come up inside the Golden temple?
There is only one message if people are interested to read the action
correctly. Golden Temple will again be used for propagating the separate
Khalistan. Respect for Bhindanwale has no two meanings. It is a way to support
the separatism. The Government should not take the situation lightly. The
Government has already called for an all-party movement to discuss the issue.
What are the options in front of the
Government? When Indira Gandhi sent the army inside the Golden Temple, all the
opposition parties except the BJP questioned the move saying that the action
will hurt the religious sentiments of the Sikh community. Will people talk in
the same tone even if the Pakistani army is holed up inside a religious place.
Politicians should understand that the terrorists and other religious fanatics
use religious places for their activities only due to such support. The
Government will face a similar situation this time as well. Many people may ask
to ignore the issue as it is just a photo that was kept in the temple. But if
it is ignored, people can be rallied around using Bhindranwale's name as a
martyr for the community and trigger another wave of separatist movement. It
will not be long before one more provocative act is committed. It is better to
destroy an egg rather than wait for a poisonous snake to be born. Let us wait and
see the happenings in the next few days. Hopefully the issue will die down in
the best interests of India.
@ Sulekha
