CHANDIGARH, India: United News of India quoted police as saying four men armed with Sten guns opened fire in the electricity Board Office in Golwar village, south of Amritsar, and said five people were killed in the office and three others were gunned down outside.
Police said 14 people were wounded in an earlier shooting in Nakodar when four suspected Sikh militants on two scooters sprayed gunfire in the districts. Violent Hindu demonstrations followed to protest the failure to arrest the four gunmen.
Authorities imposed a round-the-clock curfew to deter mob violence, Jullundur District Commissioner S.C. Agarwal said. Several terrorist attacks have occurred recently in Nakodar, which is 50 miles southeast of Amritsar.
In the third attack, gunmen shot to death a police official in Punjab’s southern district of Bhatinda, police said. The victim was identified as Inspector Gurtej Singh, a Sikh.
Punjab is the only Indian state in which Sikhs constitute a majority.
Escalating violence in the Punjab has triggered a flight of thousands of Hindu villagers, particularly from the countryside near Amritsar and Gurdaspur.
Article extracted from this publication >> June 27, 1986
