By a Staff Reporter
NEW YORK, NY: Kala, a killer who was sponsored by the Punjab police was just one of the many working to kill Sikh activists extra judicially and to kill innocent people so as to discredit the Sikh movement in Punjab, said D. S. Gill the secretary of Punjab Human Rights Organization.
He was addressing the congregation at the Sikh Cultural Society on October 15. Kala, he added was just one of the many state sponsored terrorists like Pinki in Ludhiana and Dalgir Singh of Patiala who was Killed after he shot dead two officers who were questioning him about reports of his unapproved illegal activities which included abduction and looting.
Officials first denied the existence of these hit men but after Kala was interviewed by the foreign press, they grudgingly tried to justify their actions. Such gangs like Alam Sera and Black Cats are still operating and have wreaked havoc on the state, he added.
- S. Gill aid that the Sikhs in America were to be complemented for making the U.S. Congress aware of the human right violations in Punjab. They also have to be lauded for providing legal aid to Ranjit Singh Gill and Sukhminder Singh Sandhu in their extradition case.
Gill raced the recent history of state terrorism in Punjab and said that the first fake encounter in the recent struggle was that of Kulwant Singh Nagoke when Darbara Singh as the Chief Minister.
In January 1986 four manuscripts of the holy Guru Granth Sahib were burnt at Nakodar. An investigation by the PHRO revealed that Congress-I, Akali Dal and a local Shiv Sena were involved. When the Sikhs protested this outrageously sacrilegious act, “four Sikhs including Bhai Harinder Singh the nephew of Jathedar Harcharan Singh Mahalon former Jathedar of Thakat Keshgarh Sahib, and Harminder Singh Sandhu convenor of the All India Sikh Students Federation at Layallpur Khalsa College in Jalandhar, were killed in indiscriminate police firing. Both these young men Were dragged out of a saw mill and shot in the face by an Inspector of Police with his service revolyer in front of a number of Witnesses, and no action was taken against him,” he said, A protest march led by Bimal Kaur Khalsa, the wife of late Bhai Beant Singh, against the Satluj Jamuna Canal, by which the Central government wants to take the Punjab river waters to Haryana, on 26 March 1986, the Hola Mohala day was fired upon by the police even though it was a peaceful protest, he said.
On August 30, the same year 10 Sikhs were dragged out of their homes, tortured at torture centers by the Border Security Force and killed in Dera Baba Nanak. After the PHRO published a report of investigation, the Akali Dal government in Punjab was forced to act on it. The Punjab finance minister Balwant Singh and the then interior minister Kamaljit Singh verified what had happened, but on orders from Delhi, the matter was suppressed and none of the guilty cops punished, he said.
He lambasted the Akali Dal leaders for their ‘power at any cost’ policy which even went to the extent of raiding the Golden Temple on 30 April 1986 while the Akali Dal cabinet led by Surjit Singh Barnala was in power. This was used by Rajiv Gandhi to justify the original attack on the Golden Temple by his mother, Gill said.
Four Sikhs were killed by the police on 7 October 1987 in Sangrur jail after a false alarm was announced and all the inmates were rushing out of the barracks. Two of those killed had written to the Inspector General and the Deputy Inspector General a month earlier that a deputy Superintendent of Jail Jagroop Singh had conspired to kill them in jail. When the 16 visited the prison, they again told him about their apprehensions in front of numerous witnesses. The PHRO complained to the Designated Court within the jail, and the judge there issued warrants for the jail officials. They refused to appear before the court and the contempt of court cases against them are pending in the Punjab and Haryana High Court.
Article extracted from this publication >> October 20, 1989
