JALANDHAR: The Akali Dal (Badal) has decided to launch a mass agitation in Punjab in a bid to prevent the execution of General A.S .Vaidya’s assassins, Bhai Sukhdev Singh Sukha and Bhai Harjinder Singh Jinda whose death sentence in the case was recently confirmed by the Supreme Court. Announcing that at an emergency meeting of party leaders and activists held here recently on the eve of a crucial meeting of six Panthic organizations, to be held at Amritsar, party presiding and former chief minister Parkash Singh Badal said details of the mass movement would be chalked out at the Amritsar meeting.

The party warned the Central government against carrying out the death sentence of General Vaidya’s assassins Sukhdev Singh Sukha and Harjinder Singh Jinda, saying “it will alienate the Sikh community permanently and irrevocably.”

A resolution to this effect was adopted at the party’s emergency meeting held here,

The meeting addressed among others by party president and former chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and SGPC chief Gurcharan Singh Tohra asked the Prime Minister and President to intervene personally and get the sentence against Sukha and Jinda saying that their execution would prove to be a“ Himalayan slunder.”

The resolution said the case of both Sukha and Jinda could not be viewed in isolation of the traumatic events of 1984 and said that “if ever there was a case requiring sagacity, statesmanship and understanding, this case is surely one.” It said the act of “deep religious anguish” as they had no criminal history prior to this act.

By another resolution, the party said “it recognizes only the riparian principle under which neither Haryana nor Rajasthan have any rights on the river water of Punjab and deems all records, awards and agreements in violation of this principle as null and voice. Any attempt to dilute this principle by the “bogus” government of Beant Singh would be fought tooth and nail, it added.

Expressing concern over dipping levels of ground waters in Punjab, is said “Punjab faces a near drought situation in the years ahead and as such it does not have a drop of water to spare from its river resources. The third resolution condemned the central governments “vindictive policies aimed at crushing the farmers,”

Article extracted from this publication >> Aug 7, 1992