A Rejoinder To New York Times By Gurcharan Singh

THERE was some change in the style of your news reports pertaining to Punjab and the Sikhs, but it did not last long enough. On 7/7/87 and 7/8/87, your reports used the terms “gunmen” and “suspected Sikhs”, which stopped short of jumping the gun. Such prudent reporting enables your readers to notice a distinction between the slanted official stories and eyewitness reports.

However, your reports have again drifted to the old pattern of slander against the Sikhs, instantly echoing the official lies blaming almost every incident on the Sikhs even common crimes by the people with fake beards and turbans.

To be sure, violence does not solve any problem and often in no cent people become its victims. At the same time, violence is not legitimate for one party and something else for the other. When 28 young Sikhs were gunned down in Punjab last month in fake police encounters, there was hardly any news in the free press. Your reporter Sanjay Hazarika merely mentioned it in passing in connection with a different news report on 7/9/87. However, when the Sikhs retaliate against the brutality of the security forces (CRP) there are bold headlines and a cry of “terrorism”. How come when officially instigated Hindu mobs unleash their savagery mass lynching, plundering, and burning alive innocent Sikhs and Muslims, they are reported as pretty much “kosher” incidents.

There are almost daily incidents of bomb explosions and mine blasts in Sri Lanka, but your reports do not slander either Tamils or Sinhalese. Steven Weisman, your New Delhi Bureau Chief, reported more than 3,000 landless workers brutally murdered by the landowners in Bihar (India) last year, without any sensational headlines or a cry of terrorism.

While reporting on the bomb blast in Pakistan on 7/15/87, killing 72 and wounding 250 persons, you have mentioned that “no group took responsibility”. Make no mistake, if there was such a bomb blast in India, its RAW Agency (India’s KGB) would most likely call western news agencies anonymously and take responsibility on behalf of the Sikhs. And like the RAW’s hoax telephone call to New York Times (regarding the’ tragic Air India flight from Canada in June, 1985) the free press would instantly accord credibility to unsubstantiated and fabricated “responsibility” by flashing the news across the continents inflicting media terrorism on the Sikhs all over the world.

Your reporters know, or should know, that Punjab continues to be cut of bounds to foreign press since June, 1984, except through officially guided tours, that “martial law conditions prevail”, and “security forces shoot at will”. (Washington Inquirer 4/17/87). The world reads about occupied Punjab and the Sikhs through India’s misinformation network. Is it too much to expect your reporters to make at least telephone contacts with the Sikh representatives in Amritsar (Punjab) and convey their side of the story as well?

Our repeated attempts to get some space in your columns for a few words of rebuttal or clarification have been frustrated. Our frequent knocking at your door found it more formidable than the Berlin Wall.

We once again, plead with you and the entire free press:

*To protect the Fourth Estate from becoming a tool of this state directed “sinister art of mass deception;”

* To live up to its reputation as a fearless guardian of freedom and human rights;

* To express its indignation at the “fake police encounters” for murdering the young Sikhs in occupied

Punjab;

* To check the accuracy of “hoax telephone calls” rather than accepting them as real news;

* To call the bluff of “mock hijacking” as a means to “framing” the entire Sikh nation;

* To remember that Nazi propaganda machine had “framed” the Jews to justify the eventual genocide;

* To watch out for the “drafted mercenaries” under the guise of professional journalism, for their distorted media reporting;

* to understand that this distorted media violates the human rights of the Sikhs a visible minority and provides the law enforcement agencies an excuse to carry out a “witch hunt” of the young Sikhs all over the world;

* To wake up and see the real face of this ugly monster of state terrorism hiding behind the mask of nationalism.

Article extracted from this publication >>  August 28, 1987