Honorable Nelson Mandela Soweto, 2000 Johannesburg South Africa
Dear Nelson Mandela,
It is pleasant to see you out of goal. Infact every lover of freedom, liberty, justice and humanism must express one’s joy over your release, after an internment of more than 27 years the release of a hero of freedom struggle has been applauded by almost every section of the world. The people of South Africa and even the President FW de Klerk must be thanked by everyone for their role.
Dear Mandela, you have been extended an invitation to visit India and it is learnt that you have accepted the invitation. It will be the pleasure of the people of the world to give a welcome to one of the great champions of the freedom struggles.
‘Sir, as you are well aware of the fact that your Sikh brethren are also fighting for their freedom. India has been occupying the Sikh homeland for about one century, transferred the control of the Sikh homeland (Khalistan) to the Indian regime of the Hindus. The South Africans and the Sikhs have been the victims of the alien rule; the ‘Sikhs since 1847 and the South Africans since 1814 (when Cape Town was bought by the British). So, the South Africans and the Sikhs have suffered almost the same experience.
Dear Friend. You have agreed to visit India, a land which itself has an apartheid rule in the Sikh homeland, Kashmir and Dravid Land. No Sikh, no Kashmiri and no Dravid consents to remain a slave of the Indian Apartheid.
You have fought against Apartheid throughout your life. You can well understand the agony of a nation being ruled by an Apartheid regime. You have fought against Black Laws and the Martial Law in South Africa and you are well aware of the cruelty of such Draconian Laws. You have fought for human freedom and you can feel as to how do slaves feel the pain of slavery. You are well conversant with the persecution of the people in an “Occupied Territory.”
Dear Brother the Sikhs welcome you to Asia and request you to visit the Sikh homeland too. A visit to the Sikh homeland will enrich you with information about the State terrorism in India, about the Black Laws, which are more cruel than those prevalent in the South Africa, an apartheid which is more cruel, callous and more inhuman than that of Apartheid in the South Africa. You will learn about the cold blooded killings of more than 100,000 Sikhs by the Indian apartheid regime. You will learn about the massacres, genocides, persecution and the sufferings of the Sikh nation.
Dear Mandela, I hope you will agree with me that there is no classification of freedom. The freedom of the blacks in South Africa and the freedom of the Sikhs in the Sikh homeland (under Indian occupation) don’t have different meanings. The politicians throughout the world have supported your cause and now it is time for you to make your contribution for human struggle beyond the boundaries of South Africa. The Sikhs are one of those few who are watching with great concern. Your gesture is crucial for the Sikh nation. The Sikhs hope that you shall ask the Indian Apartheid to stop the persecution of the Sikh nation and also to surrender the control of the Sikh homeland to the ‘Sikh nation.
I go a step further, your slogan, the Sikh slogan and the slogan of every freedom fighter should be: “Freedom fighters of the world UNITE.”
Dr. Harjinder Singh Dilgeer Norway
Article extracted from this publication >> March 9, 1990
