Kent England: Khalistan Government in exile has urged the Sikh ‘communities around the world to play their role in its political offensive to counter the Indian government’s ploys to isolate them in the comity of nations and promote mis under standings about the Just struggle being conducted by their brothern in the Sikh homeland.

“While the Sikh faith makes it incumbent on its followers to seek Peace and respect the laws of their host countries,” President Sewa Singh Lalli has said in a message to the nation, “It also requires them to support the just struggle of their Oppressed brothern so far as the perimeters of these laws permit.”

He said that the Indian Government was using the immense resources at its disposal to convince the world that it was committed to respect he universally recognized human rights of the Sikhs, has in place judicial remedies for the victims of excesses by its functionaries, and that it is the Sikhs —not the security forces deployed in their homeland— who are to be blamed for the cycle of deaths, destruction and other excesses in the Sikh homeland.

“But these claims are belied by the actual happenings,” he said. He pointed out that, while the Indian Prime Minister assured his British counterpart, John Major, in January this year that any Government functionary violating the human rights of the Sikhs will face the judicial process, and will be punished for his excesses, the arbitrary arrests, extrajudicial killings, tortures, rapes and other excesses have continued unabated.

“Not only that,” he added, “Punjab Police Chief, KPS Gill, justified these excesses in his interview with journalists—and no judicial process has been initiated against him, He has not even been disciplined for his implied admission that Sikh human rights are being violated—for whatever reasons.

“In another statement to the press, he arrogantly announced that he will not allow human rights organizations to enter the Sikh homeland till 1995—by when he hopes to have silenced all protests and coerced the Sikhs nation into silence.

“And, while the Indian Minister for Home Affairs assured the world that Amnesty International could send its observers anywhere except Punjab and Kashmir, the Government in Bombay has denied permission to it to send a fact-finding mission to investigate charges of police excesses in that Stale,

“This iron curtain around the states of Kashmir, Punjab and Bombay is clearly aimed at preventing human rights organizations and other impartial observers from finding the real truth about the areas designated by the Indian rulers as trouble spots—and, like Bombay, any area could be so designated at any time, In other words, the whole of India can be made ‘out of bounds’ for impartial observers.

” He said that the Iron Curtain was obviously a device to cover up the falsehood in the Indian claims of commitment to respect the human rights.

He said that this cover up was intended tenable the donor countries to continue 16 give financial assistance to the Indian rulers— and to put the blame for the unrest of their own making on the oppressed peoples—the Kashmiris, the Sikhs and the Muslims.

The bait offered to the donor Countries is the prospects of trade deals with India—and has been taken by several countries. “It is time the Sikh emigrants countered the deceptive propaganda and brought home to the people of their host countries the fact that it is foreign aid that enables the Indian rulers to divert the indigenous resources to oppress. The minorities and beat them into abject slavery.”

He urged the Sikhs all over the world to lobby the legislators, politicians and other molders of Government policies; present to them the evidence of Indian excesses —with which reports from their indigenous media are replace “Khalistan Government in exile appeals to Sikh communities all over the world to play their role in this political offensive,”

He said. “Setup media monitoring units to collect evidence of Indian excesses contained in the media reports. And organize functions to lobby the molders of Government policies.

For further guidance and help with relevant material, please contact Government in exile. Neither Republic of Khalistan 44 nor fold Road, Gravesend Kent DA12, 2 RH, England UK.

Article extracted from this publication >>  August 13, 1993