The Indian Supreme Court had directed Punjab’s avoid general ML. Sarin to take personal interest in finding out within: ‘one month the whereabouts of Akali Dal human rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra who was alleged to have been abducted by the Tam Taran district police on September 6, 1995, from his Amritsar residence, Sarin in his report last week, told the court that “we ourselves are very Keen of Know about what has happened to Khalra.” He presumably meant from “we he himself and the new chief minister of Punjab, Harcham Singh Brar, Sarin admitted that the Punjab police had been unable to trace the missing leader and that the Punjab government had no Objection if the enquiry is conducted by the C.B.I. or any other independent agency. Khalra’s wife’s advocate R.S. Sodhi remarked that the state government had itself admitted that it could not maintain Jaw and order nor did it have power over its police, Clearly the government is unfit to perform its constitutional duty of ensuring the safety of its citizens. Justice Kuldip Singh, once of the two judges hearing the petition, quipped that it was not the state government’s fault because the state is in the grip of police terror.

Justice Kuldip Singh’s remark lets the cat out of the bag. Despite claims of restoration of democracy in Punjab, the state remains in the hands of the police. The Punjab government’s own abdicate general who enjoys the confidence of his chief minister shows the state government’s helplessness in the face of the police raj. The police are directly controlled by India Prime Minister Narasimha Rao and officers under him in the so-called prime minister house.” Khalra has thus been abducted by the police of Tam Taran district only because he had collected evidence to expose the dreadful act of the police of killing 25000 Sikhs and burning their bodies. Despite a few murder cases registered against the Tam Taran police chief, he remains posted in that district, even chief minister Brar has no power to transfer the police officer. The obvious reason is that Rao has unconstitutionally retained that power in his own hands.

The Supreme Court has still to make the final order as to what should be done in the Khalra abduction case. Sarin says that Punjab government will have no objection if enquiry is conducted by the C.B.I. or some other “independent agency.” The presumption is that the C.B.I. is an independent agency. However, the fact is that the C.B.I. itself is in the hands of Prime Minister Rao who may be interested in covering up, this time, through the €.B.1. There are countless stories in the Indian media about how the C.B.I. is being used by the prime minister in dealing with the Bofors case, other cases of corruption as well as the Chandraswamy case, In respect of the murder of Ropar advocate Kulwant Singh, his wife and their infant son about two years ago, the C.B.I. gave a report which is neither here nor there. Which it rightly exonerated militant Harpreet Singh (Happy) of the murder charge, the C.B.I, failed to question and arrest the police officers responsible for the heinous crime. The central agency was content merely at suggesting the ‘“‘needle of suspicion” moving towards the four Punjab police officers, who, too, are incidentally posted in Tam Taran district.

At the intervention of the Indian Supreme Court or the Punjab and Haryana high court, criminal cases have been registered against at least four dozen police officers for murders and other human rights violations of Sikhs and others but not a single case has progressed satisfactorily. All these cases are being allowed to go the Way the Delhi anti-Sikh riot cases went. Guilty officers are not even transferred from the areas where the cases took place. ‘Thus an unwritten permission has been granted to them to destroy all the evidence against them. The Khalra case falls in that category. The one person responsible for this state of affairs is none other than India’s Prime Minister Narasimha Rao. The Punjab police chief K.P.S. Gill himself faces criminal charges in a Chandigarh court. Yet, he has been allowed to stay in his post, contrary to the Indian service law that such officers, are made to vacate their posts. The Khalra case has rightly attracted worldwide attention. A group of 65 members of the U.S. Congress wrote to Prime Minister Rao to release the Sikh human rights activist, The Amnesty International, too, drew the world’s attention towards. Khalra’s abduction and appealed to the Indian government to trace and release him. But these appeals are having no effect on India which cynically brushes aside the calls from the world public.

Article extracted from this publication >> November 17, 1995