Quebec is a French-speaking province of Canada. Recent developments there have more than the local significance. In its Assembly a resolution has been presented which could lead to the province’s secession from the country. The Canadian Constitution provides for voting for a province to go out of the country. The elected premier of the province has initiated steps to hold the poll to decide the future of the province. There has been a controversy on whether the premier should have presented a bill before the Assembly prior to holding a poll The conflict of views is limited to the procedure rather than the substance of the idea of separation No one questions the basic premise viz. everyone has an inalienable right to decide their future.
The Canadian Constitution truly reflects the spirit of human rights and democracy enshrined in the U.N. charter. If the people of a state or province want to be free or separate from the mainland, no heavens are going to fall. The Canadian federal authorities have not dubbed the pro-freedom province and its leaders as separatists nor have they equated them with militants. There has been no international has and cry over the matter. Nor in this case has the U.S. administration pledged its support to the federal government to maintain the “Unity and integrity of Canada. On the other hand, the Quebec premier has visited France to enlist that country’s support for the separatist cause back home. The French prime minister has, on his part, lent support to the premier’s stand. He went to the extent of stating that the French government would be one of the first governments to recognize an independent Quebec should its people so decide as a result of the poll to be held later this year.
The Canadian practice of handling its domestic affairs democratically is a shining example for countries like India to follow where hundreds of millions of people are struggling for freedom from the Colonial bondage of Delhi. Thousands of political activists in Punjab. Kashmir, in the north east and Andhra have been arrested merely for seeking a separate geographic entity for their people Lakhs of persons have been killed in contrived police encounters with activists in the past 48 years of India’s so-called freedom. Fascist laws like TADA and National Security Act have been in operation. In fact, fascist practices are followed in a “natural and routine manner in India, Resistance to the abrogation of these lawless laws is so strong in that country that international pressure falls flat on India’s leaders.
Quebec developments contrast sharply with the events in India. It is a pity that business-conscious state administrations like the one in the U.S. are on the side of the repressive Indian regime. These developments expose the ugly face of the world’s largest democracy, as well as its ill-advised supporters in the west. The Sikhs and other groups in the west have to understand and adequately broadcast the significance of the events in Quebec to enlighten the world about the real face of India’s fake democracy and the plight of its thousands of victims. The U.S. administration, too, has to learn a thing or two from Quebec in so far as its attitude towards India is concerned.
Article extracted from this publication >> February 24, 1995
