The Panth notes that at the present moment, on the eve of expected far-reaching changes in the constitution of the country the desire on the part of the majorities to dominate the minorities is rising with great tempo, as is evidenced by the slogans of Akhand Hindustan and Pakistan.

It further notes that in a situation so greatly charged with aggressive communalism, the minorities, and especially the Sikhs, find themselves placed in a position in which they cannot safeguard their national existence against the highhandedness of a politically organised communal majority, which conviction is further strengthened by the experience of the working of Provincial Autonomy for nine years, resulting in grave attacks being made on the cultural, civic and political nights of the Sikhs in the Punjab.

After giving mature and thoughtful consideration to the foregoing, the Panth is strongly of the opinion that no safeguards and guarantees of a constitutional nature, no weightage or protection, promised to the Sikhs by any of the majority communities can be considered adequate to protect the Sikhs and ensure their free and unhindered growth as a nationality with a distinct religious, ideological, cultural and political character. In order to ensure the free and unfettered growth of the Sikh Panth, the Panth demands the splitting up of the existing province of the Punjab, with its unnatural boundaries, so as to constitute a separate autonomous Sikh State in those areas of the Central, Northern, Eastern, and South Eastern Punjab in which the overwhelming part of the Sikh population is concentrated, and which because of the proprietors in it being mostly Sikhs, and its general character being distinctly Sikh, is also the de facto Sikh Home land the area, extent, the status and constitutional framework of such a State being left to be settled by negotiation between the accredited representatives of the Sikh Panth and the other interested parties such as the British Government, the Hindus and the Muslims; further resolving that the above demand is the unconditional, absolute and minimum demand and political objective of the Sikh Panth as a whole.

The Panth visualizes that this proposed state will be democratic in constitution and will have a socialistic economic structure, with full protection of the culture and rights of the minorities.

Article extracted from this publication >> November 2, 1990