Built by the fifth Guru Arjan Dev Darbar Sahib is the epicenter of Sikh faith which has served as the principal place of inspiration direction and rallying center of the Sikhs. It has been nucleus of religious and political activities of the Sikhs over the centuries Inter twined around the Shrine are the hallowed memories of their Gurus saints and martyrs their hopes and fears their son g s and talks of hero: ism their struggles and triumphs it reminds them of their great heritage eventful history and tradition and of so many legends that have become attached to it through the centuries. Throughout the entire n of its eventful history the it has been the center of free thought and a cradle of martyrs who made supreme sacrifices to defend its sanctity. Realizing the significance of the Temple as the heart and soul of the Sikh faith the invaders made it the target of their attacks in order to liquidate the Sikhs. It was thrice destroyed and thrice rebuilt in the 18th century and symbolized the dauntless Khalsa spirit.
Desecration and toot of sacred places by invaders like Mohammad ‘Gauri Changez Khan Abdali and others is known but history records no peace time parallel of a gruesome event involving the destruction of the holiest place of a minority by its own government. The attack of the Indian army on the Darbar Sahib conducted under the innocuous title of Blue Star Operation” on June 6,1984 will go down as the most horrendous event in the post-Independence India The attack lacerated the deepest chord of the Sikh psyche. it was an attack on their faith and their identity in fact their very being An entire community felt deeply stabbed. Shaken humiliated and alienated ‘The sentiments of each Sikh were epitomized by an uneducated lady from Faridkot while talking to a journalist “It is like making me naked in public and assaulting me.””! It was indeed a rape of the community.
By the recognized tests-number of killings manner of killings numbers rendered homeless number of buildings raised to the ground the Blue Star holocaust was worse than any other event known to recent history of mankind A brave and patriotic community was pushed to the wall The emotional bonds that linked the Sikhs with the country were visibly shaken if mot severed. The shells that tore holes in the Sikh shrine also ruptured the natural ties of the Sikhs with the nation and its people. The reaction of the two communities to the attack presented a noteworthy contrast. On the one hand was the entire Hindu community supporting the action cither through the press or their representatives in democratic institutions or spokesmen of government or administration or armchair academicians and ‘on the other hand was the reaction of Sikh community whether literate or illiterate sophisticated or unsophisticated urban or reality condemning the action with one voice The Sikhs who took pride in playing the role of brave and unflinching soldiers in guarding the country’s frontiers felt betrayed The Sikh women who braving all hazards of their visit to the front lines of the battle during the Indo Pakistan War gave ample proof of their boundless patriotism by carrying bundles of food and pots of milk and curd on their heads to Serve the army jawans felt grievously hurt when they became victims of the wrath of the same army of a fate contrived by human hands it was an irony that the most patriotic Community which had undergone untold sufferings and persecutions to save the freedom and honor of the country Was thrown into the crucible of fire on a charge of lack
of patriotism. For nothing can be more destructive to human bonds than to accuse a person of disloyalty and betrayal when he feels emotionally linked by cords of friendship and love.
What added to the anguish of the Sikhs was the glorification of the horrendous event by the majority community the government and the media. Narsimha Rao the then Home Minister of India described it as “the right actions are the right time and in the right manner.” He Said that “there could not be x greater hour of glory for the Indian polity democracy and secular ism” The “victory
Was celebrated without realizing how destructive and suicidal its results could be for the future of the Indian Policy and secularism. A serious failure was represented as a Len triumph of the government
There by completely clouding the vision of everyone outside the Sikh community to have a glimpse of the reality and the ominous results it could have for the country. It is & classic case of how in modem times a media controlled only by one community or class could create a dark curtain of disinformation to cover and conceal the truth from the public however literate and aware it may be. The Indian media not only maintained a guilty silence over wanton killings but also indulged in malicious propaganda and resorted to a number of lies and half-truths.
What was being paraded as secularism by the high prices is of the media was an undisguised Hindu communal altitude. It was unfortunate that almost the entire media became a willing tool of the Prime Minster to support her policies against the Sikhs Prem Bhatia Chief Editor of the Tribune group ‘of newspapers said the Blue Star was a ‘neat” operation He ‘went whole hog to support Indira Gandhi. When a newspaper columnist told him that Punjab has shattered the Prime Minister just as her father had been shattered by his experience of China Bhatia wrote that this assessment was a long way from the truth. He recalled his meeting with her in her South Block office after the army action and wrote “She looked five years younger.””3 However the fact was that Indira Gandhi never recovered from the effects of this blunder till the end. In a recently published biography entitled Rajiv Sonia Gandhi has observed:” After Operation Blue Star a shadow had entered our lives My mother-in law spoke to Rajiv and me about arrangements from her funeral She wrote down her instructions. She talked to Rahul separately. She told him to be brave when the time came; She had lived her life and done all she had to do and could do; he Was not to cry for her /Pupil Jayakar a friend and biographer of Indira Gandhi has also revealed that “she had Premonition that he life was coming to an end™ Jayakar who met Indira Gandhi a few days after the army attack writes “She had aged. There were lines on her forehead and a supreme gravity in She did not wish to speak
Punjab and I asked no gesture What a distortion our media or a Chief Editor are capable of is obvious from the contrasted visions that while everyone knew that Indira Gandhi was a broken person after the Blue Star attack and her visit to the gory scene of disaster at Amritsar Bhatia’s vision described her as ‘five years younger.” It is also a classic example of the kind of “truth” media ‘writes or welcomes to publish side by side making a black out of the realities. Here under we give a few instances of foreign media.
Ross Benson of the Daily Express London in the issue of June 191984 wrote “Mrs.Gandhi has sown the seeds for a bitter future by ordering the desecration.” The Times London (June21, 1984)in a Very perceptive editorial wrote “Future historians will almost certainly look back upon June 6.1984 as a turning point in the long and turbulent political life of Mrs Indira Gandhi. The short-term gain is almost undeniable with elections in the offing. She has already split the Opposition and won the general acclaim of Hindus as Mother India imposing a parental discipline upon those who transgress in the interests of keeping the family together. In the long-term however That could still be her political epitaph.”
The attack on Darbar Sahib held Fulminous religious and political portents. It became a festering sore in the body-politic of the country and the problem acquired new dimensions. The images that flashed across the bruised Sikh psyche were that of sacrilege the martyrdom of Bhindranwale and the brutalities of the horrendous act against the Sikhs. In the preparation days it was the painful memory of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre which had disillusioned the Sikhs. Now the Sikhs find it difficult to erase from their effective psyche the bitter memories of the bloody assaulting the Darbar Sahib. After the Jallianwala massacre though much smaller in magnitude the British government had the discretion to admit that it was a savage brutal and a cold blooded act. Winston Churchill the British Secretary of War said “It is an extra-ordinary step which stands in singular and sinister isolation.” The British regime had bowed to the demand to appoint a commission of enquiry known as the Hunter Commission to go into the event the government of India’s refusal to appoint a commission to explain as to what happened before during and after the Blue Star in ramifications is an abject confession of failure
The contemporary history of Punjab especially during the past one decade has been grossly misrepresented. The White Paper issued by the government was nothing but an unashamed attempt to conceal the reality and justify the Blue Star attack. Lt General K.S.Brar in his recently published book ‘Operation Blue Star: The True Story’ has also toed the official line and has tried to mislead the national and international opinion regarding the horrendous event. ‘Those who perpetuate crimes cannot assume the role of historians Self-righteousness is nothing but ignoble
Two facts are significant about the contemporary history of Punjab. First a complete black out of the gross socio-political and economic injustice done to Punjab in the framing of the Reorganization Act of 1966 under which Punjab was made a truncated sub-state and its water and hydel power resources were largely and unconstitutionally diverted to non-riparian Hindu states: Few chroniclers have: recorded that all government of India measures including the Blue Star were just means to camouflage the reality and divert public attention from the truth of exploitation and injustice done Second that after the Blue Star few writers or even public supporters of the government have justified the Blue Star The only exception were the perpetrators of the unjustified and unjustifiable tragedies of Blue Star and Wood Rose An instant of this category is K.S.Brar who as the General responsible for this attack now seeks to become a belated mouth piece of the government propaganda machine.
Another civil servant S.S.Dhanoa who had been the Chief Secretary and Adviser to the Governor of Punjab during the aftermath of Blue Star attack has like General Brar taken up the same role of reproducing the White Paper which even otherwise must have been made on their colored reports. In a recent write up Quo-Vadis Where Do Sikhs go from Here?’ published in the Sikh Review (April 1994) Dhanoa wrote; ‘It is significant that the Singh Sabha Movement came into being precisely in the same year in which Namdharis were massacred. Sadly the Namdharis thereafter got relegated to the background as a mere sect of Sikhism while the Singh Sabla Movement produced the environment for the modem generation of the Sikhs to come up and hold their own in the 20th Century colonial India. i am somehow incapable of converting my
Anguish over the Operation Blue Star into anger against the Indian State as i am conscious of my silence when the Golden Temple complex had been taken over by Killers and Sant Jarnail Singh
Bhindranwale legitimized the of innocent Hindus in order to avenge various slights meted out to Sikhs.”
Understandably Brar and Dhanoa were willing instruments of the Government discipline or out of their natural Weakness were incapable of expressing the truth But few persons tend or pretend to call their helplessness or weakness noble virtue as has been done by these two limns of the then military and civil administration. It is an evident fact that neither Brar nor Dhanoa were in a position to defy government instructions much less could they express any anger in that regard. For self-justification of one’s own deeds can hardly be worthwhile history. It is a Well-known historical contrast that where as a Dyer and an O ’Dwyer suffered disgrace and censure under colonial government Our Brar’s and Dhanu as stand rewarded to eulogize the dreadful deeds of their Masters The entire truth cannot be dug out unless the secret documents and records of the government arc made public. An issue of ‘Surya’ revealed some startling facts and brought to light the most obnoxious features of the policy of the government It was discovered that the whole operation was initiated conducted and concluded by a Super intelligence organization codenamed “Third Agency “This was on the basis of exclusive information provided to Surya by some officers of the RAW.
In retrospect it appears that the Prime Minister had a premeditated design to apply a military solution instead of a constitutional solution to the Punjab crisis but was mark time so that the situation may further deteriorate for justifying that solution. We give below two important observations of the Sunday Times London in support of our ment of the situation the in army drew up is invasion (of Golden Temple) strategy nine months ago. A week ago last Friday Mrs.Gandhi seized the perfect opportunity to use it.
Government had repeatedly declared that it would not send police into the Darbar Sahib. But the fact is that the Government had started preparations for the military action months before June 1984. A large model of the Darbar Sahib Complex had been prepared at a camp ‘of the Special Frontier Force at Chakrata in the foothills of the Himalayas and commandos were trained for this A British correspondent of the ‘Sunday Times” London noted Last week’s assault of the Golden Temple took place afier months of preparation of the Indian army which included advice from British experts in counter-insurgency. Sources in Delhi say that two officers of the Indian secret service Gary Saxena and R.N Kay of the Research and Analysis Wing made several trips to London to seek expertise. The Indian Government then selected 600 men from different units and sent them to rehearse the assault on a life size replica of the Golden Temple built at a secret training camp in the Chakrata Hills about 150 miles north of Delhi. The assault troops were alerted to invade the Temple no fewer than five times during the last week months but each time rs .Gandhi vetoed the invasion A case of nerves” according to a senior aide.” REFERENCES
L Dhillon G. Sainia Commits Suicide (Chandigarii1992) p.279 2ndian Express Juns 12 & July 281984 3. The Tribune. July 8.1984. 4.Gandhi Sonia; Rajiv (New Delhi 1992)
S Jayokar Papal; Indira Gandhi (Now Dothi1992) p.483
6 Ibid p.468
7.The Surva September 1984
8.Sunday Times London June 101984 9.Ibid.
Dr. Gurdarshan Singh Dhillon Punjab University Chandigarh
Article extracted from this publication >> June 3, 1994
