Appeal by Shiromani Akali Dal and Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee to the United Nations
The United Nations is seized with the restoration of peace in Afghanistan and Cambodia through active intervention in the affairs of these countries. Similar occurrences in the Indian subcontinent have yet to engage the attention of the United Nations. Punjab, for the last eight years is reeling under the suppression and aggression of the Indian security forces.
It is our hope and prayer that, like in E1 Salvador, Cambodia and Yugoslavia, the United Nations, will take unilateral steps to protect the honour and dignity of the Sikh people in the Punjab. Our attention is specifically drawn to the humanitarian intervention to protect the Kurdish population from genocide in Iraq. This expectation has prompted the representative bodies of the Sikh nation to appeal to the United Nations.
Sikhs are a religious community and a political nation simultaneously, about twenty-five million in numbers. They are mainly concentrated in the Punjab, but also settled in most countries of the world. Sikhism and its apotheosis, the Khalsa is a unique political society with a distinct religion, language, culture, ethos, a historic territory and political thought irrevocably committed to freedom of conscience and dignity of man.
The Sikh people set up a republic under the leadership of Banda Singh Bahadur in 1711. Later Maharaja Ranjit Singh established the Sikh empire which was annexed by the British in 1849. However, the British government honoured and respected the separate identity and status of the Sikhs. In 1946, when the British decided to leave India, they made it distinctly clear those three parties– the Congress, the Muslim League and the Sikhs were true heirs to sovereignty. Earlier too, under the Government of India Act of 1935, a separate electorate existed for the Sikhs,
Mussulmen’s and others. In 1930-31, the Sikh leadership was especially invited for talks at the Round Table Conference in London. The Sikhs also participated as a nation in the Cabinet Mission plan.
Today the problem of nations and nationalities is a global issue. The Sikh nation is no exception.
The predicament of the Sikhs is seriously affecting cordial relations between countries in the Indian sub-continent as well as in Europe and America as the Sikhs are an international community. But the problem is not an one-sided affair of the Sikhs. The fascist and colonial policies of the Government of India since partition of the country in 1947 and the use of brute force by the formidable Indian state since 1984 are responsible for the present stalemate.
Prior to 1947, the Hindu leaders made political promises and commitments to the Sikh nation which were to be prerequisites for peaceful coexistence. In 1931, at the annual session of the Indian National Congress, at Lahore, when the demand for complete independence was first voiced, it was unanimously resolved that no constitution would be framed in free India which is not fully acceptable to the Sikhs.
In 1946-47, during the first sitting of the Constituent Assembly, after the oath-taking, the first resolution moved and which was later on adopted was to provide that the Indian government at the Centre would be a federal government with powers only on three subjects–communication, defence and foreign affairs, and that all other powers were to go to the federating units. However the document prepared laid too much emphasis on centralism with sweeping powers to the Union.
In this way the basic terms and conditions of the contract between the Sikhs and India was undermined leaving the Sikhs with no choice but to reject the constitution and the representatives of the Shiromani Akali Dal did not sign the document.
Till today the constitution of India has not been accepted by the Sikhs. Although, it is true that inspite of this, the Sikhs and their political parties continued to participate in the political process in India. They did so in the earnest hope that the majority community will respect the just aspirations and desires of the minorities. But the last fifty years have been a bad dream, a nightmarish one. Our solemn trust has been betrayed and we are perturbed at the underhand attempts to denigrate the Sikh religion, language, culture and values. So much so that linguistic recognition to Punjab was granted only after a prolonged and protracted peaceful struggle. Nonetheless the issue remains unresolved.
1984 marked a watershed in the relations between the Sikh nation and the Union of India. The Indian armed forces bombarded and vandalized the holiest of Sikh shrines–the Darbar Sahib, popularly known as the Golden Temple, the Akal Takhat Sahib–the temporal seat of the Sikh religion and 37 other Sikh shrines. The two shrines mentioned have the same sanctity and place in the Sikh psyche as the Kaaba has for Muslims and the Vatican for Catholics. This destruction violated all provisions of international law, clearly laid out conventions and covenants of the United Nations and also India’s own constitution. In the last week of the same year in a country-wide genocidal pogrom, more than 20,000 Sikhs were murdered in cold blood in broad daylight all over the country.
Since 1984, draconian black laws like the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Act, the Special Courts Act and the National Security Act rule Punjab under which thousands of young. men and women including senior political leaders, jurists and journalists continue to languish in jails and torture chambers for want of speedy trials. The U.Ns Human Rights Committee has on more than one occasion questioned the records of the government of India in the usage of these laws for preventive detention. The people of Punjab are enmeshed in a fierce battle for survival. The resistance movement is spearheaded by the Shiromani Akali Dal and other non-parliamentary groups who are combating the offensive of the government troops.
Very little is known to the outside world of the trying times the Sikh people are facing in their homeland. Press censorship, media blitzkrieg by the state-owned electronic media and Indian diplomatic lobbying ensure that the truth about Punjab is subverted.
More than ever before the United Nations has a significant role to play. The maintenance of peace and the prevention of armed conflict are the vital concerns of the United Nations. Respect for human rights at all times and in all places is a fundamental principle of the organisation. The Union of India, which is a signatory to the U.N. Charter and to various U.N. conventions and covenants, is posing a challenge to the United Nations by its continued violation of U.N. conventions, international law and international humanitarian law. Illegal detention, preventive detention, stage-managed encounters and involuntary disappearances are daily occurrences in the Punjab. Isn’t it curious that since the last five years, the Supreme Court of India has not found time, to adjudicate upon the validity of the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Act under which thousands stand incarcerated? Your Excellency should also know that one of the NGOs with Observer status at the United Nations that is Amnesty International is denied access to the Punjab.
The Shiromani Akali Dal appreciates that the critical situation in the Punjab is a hindrance to lasting peace in the region. We are committed to the establishment of a new peaceful world order. The Sikhs unquestionably stand for a solution to the impasse. We assure you Mr. Secretary-General that the Sikhs will defend themselves till their last breath, but are also conscious and mindful that it is well-nigh impossible to cow down a mighty modern state with the third largest army and a colossal arsenal of sophisticated arms and nuclear weapons. We therefore believe that the intercession of the United Nations in the Punjab will lead to an era of peace in the Indian sub-continent.
The dispute is simple. Sikhs have been colonized. Their historic, economic, social, political and religious potential has been throttled in their homeland. Their natural resources, river waters and agricultural produce is subject to colonial policies of the government of India. Therefore, the Shiromani Akali Dal and the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee consider it pertinent to point out that the “Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples ” adopted in 1960 without a dissenting vote denounces the subjection of peoples to alien governance as contrary to the Charter of the United Nations. This declaration, among other things, says that:
“All peoples have the right to self-
determination and by virtue of that right
they freely determine their political
status and freely pursue their economic,
social and cultural development.
Inadequacy of political, economic, social
or educational preparedness should never
serve as a pretext for delayed independence.
All armed action or repressive measures
of all kinds directed against dependent
peoples shall cease in order to enable
them to exercise peacefully and freely
their right to complete independence,
and the integrity of their national
territories shall be respected. ”
The contemporary role of the United Nations in the resolution of disputes in various countries raises our hopes and expectations. We take courage from the reported statement of Your Excellency wherein you have affirmed that transformation in the role of United Nations will compel it to intervene in internal disputes of member countries and that the United Nations will not limit itself to peacekeeping but extend its scope to peace building and even national reconciliation.
We are conscious of the significant role of the United Nations in Cambodia, Yugoslavia, Western Sahara, Lebanon, Angola, El-Salvador, Cyprus, Arab-Israel and Iraq-Kuwait. We petition for U.N. intervention in the Punjab so that ground rules can be settled and inherent paradoxes are resolved. We deeply appreciate the exceptional policing arrangements made by the U.N. in Iraq for the protecting of the Kurdish population. We solicit
Similar protection from the United Nations in the post-cold-war era as we are also suffering crimes against humanity including genocide at the hands of the Indian security forces. Six army corps ( One crop with sixty thousand armed combatants ) of the Indian army are posted in the Punjab and in addition there are two hundred thousand Para-military, police, home guards and other security personnel who run the state as a large police camp. These security personnel terrorize, rape, plunder and humiliate innocent Sikhs. At Nathu ke Burj in 1991 the Indian army shot dead six innocent Sikh farmers in cold blood. Similar incidents at villages Lopoke, Sangha and Rataul have been reported to the government but no army person has been reprimanded. We seek Your Excellency’s indulgence in stopping and preventing attacks on civilians and as such we urge military operations to save our maltreated men, women and children by broadening the parameters of the peacekeeping forces in which Kurds are being protected inside Iraq.
The Sikh nation, represented by the Shiromani Akali Dal and the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee are convinced that the Indian state is incapable of holding independent elections in the state of Punjab’and has recently foisted a Quisling regime which could barely get eight per cent votes.
In this hour of crisis, the Sikh nation appeals through you to the nations of the world to satisfy the quest and yearnings of the Sikh people by allowing the people’s will to manifest in an appropriate manner.
Demilitarization and decolonization of the Punjab is crucial and indispensable to enable the Sikh people to enjoy full freedom to exercise their economic, social and cultural rights. Like all free peoples of the world, the Sikh nation, in accordance with the U.N. Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples seeks an independent and sovereign state to break the shackles of apartheid, slavery, colonialism and a retrograde political system and structure.
Simranjit Singh Mann
Parkash Singh Badal Gurcharan Singh Tohra
Sukhbir Singh Inderpal Singh Kalsa,
Harcharan Singh Rajinder Singh Monga
