The first question we asked ourselves, as a team concerned with the democratic rights of people in Punjab, was: Where does the attack on the people of Punjab come from, and who are the targets of this attack? How is it affecting the life of the people in Punjab?
The people in Punjab are certainly suffering at the hands of communal terrorists. However, the nature of this terror has been projected misleadingly by the Government and the private media, for their own reasons. The communal terrorists have not restricted their attacks to Hindus.
Before 1982, the main targets of Bhindranwale followers were Nirankari Sikhs. For the six months before bus massacres at Lalru and Fatehbad, the two were again Sikhs.
the majority of those killed (During January 1 to June 30 this year, of 394 killed, 224 were Sikhs.) Even in communal terrorist attacks on Hindus, Sikhs are terrorized into not intervening.
Sardar Karnail Singh, a 73-year old freedom fighter of Kukran- wale village, told us: One Harbhajan Singh, a good man, and an employee of the electricity board, was shot here last December. Life has become so insecure, I don’t know if I’ll be alive the next minute.
Here, outside the home, there’s no difference between Hindu and Sikh, no division at all.
There are terrorists, who loot the people. Some may even be Government agents, or agents of others. These people have made our lives insecure. Those who are armed in the village are ready with their arms. But we who are mainly unarmed, how can we defend ourselves? When ten of them come with arms, the whole village is terrified.
Another old Sikh added when anyone recognises the looters, the terrorists attack and kill him. The villagers are so terrified when they attack a house that all the villagers lock themselves in and don’t come out. Here there is no difference between Hindu and Sikh.” Khalistanis’ attempt to terrorize Sikhs.
The Khalistanis in March this year announced, by means of posters, a 13-point “social reform” programme. The text of this poster is given below, in a rough translation.
“Victory to the Panth Victory to God. Victory to the Sword.”
“KHALISTAN ZINDABAD !”
“There is a conspiracy by the Hindu society to finish the Sikh nation, to addict Sikh youth to intoxicants, and drive them on to the path of evil. There are many more conspiracies to defame the Sikhs, from which the Panth must remain cautious. Whosoever does not shun the social evils listed below shall be awarded capital punishment.”
“WARNING FROM THE KHALISTAN COMMANDO FORCE!”
“(1) The Amritdhari Sikhs who use intoxicants (2) Those who ell and distil liquor (3) Those who inform the police about the active and hideouts of militant Sikhs (4) Those who trim their hair and beard (literal translation: those Guru’s insignia) (5) Butchers who kill animals for meat (6) Any Policeman, revenue clerk BDO’s office, or tehsildar reported to the office of the Federation) (7) Those who give and take dowry, who sing lewd songs during marriages, and who pornographic literature(8) Those take more than 11 person in a marriage party (9) Those who sit in front of Guru Granth Sahib under the influence of liquor (10) Those who visit Radhaswamis and Sant Dhesianwale, who believe in sorcery and jagratas, and also those who buy the property of Hindus (11) Those who run liquor shops, and also the ragis, dhadis (Sikh bards), preachers, granthis, and government employees who drink liquor (12) Those who sell tobacco, bidis, cigarettes, and opium in the villages as well as the cities (13) Those who send forged threatening letters and those who commit dacoities in the house of Amritdharis and other Sikhs.
“All the above will not be pardoned under any conditions, and will instead be burnt alive.
“Note: Heads of schools are hereby asked to prescribe the following uniforms for school children. For boys: Kesar turbans, white shirts, and black pants. For girls: Kesari dupattas, white shirts, and black salwars Any headmaster who does not prescribe this uniform will be killed.
Servants of The Sikh Panth
Hanjinder Singh Jinda, Lt. Genl. Bhat Labh Singh
Khalistan Commando Force. Chief, Khalistan Commando
Publisher: Malkiat Singh, Ajnala.”’ Force;
This fascistic programme in the garb of checking social evils was, by its very nature, aimed at terrorizing common Sikhs into con- forming to Khalistani dictates, even in their private lives. For some time, liquor vends and cigarette shops, tailors’ shops (the Khalistanis declared that women would not be allowed any type of fashion in their dress) and barbers, shops were closed or were attacked by the terrorists. Many Sikhs who violated the dictates of the {3-point programme were threatened or killed. In particular, Mazbhi (Scheduled Caste) Sikhs were terrorised,
Professional criminals:
That the communal terrorists are professional criminals first of all is demonstrated by the fact that they have been extorting fantastic sums from village doctors with threatening letters. In January 1987, Dr Satish Kumar Sharma in Gurdaspur was sent a letter Idling him to collect Rs. 50,000 in 3 to 4 days. Then, around the specified date, two men came to the clinic. The patients were in the waiting room. The terrorists made preparations to kill Sharma. Two women tried to stop them, but they were pushed aside. The terrorists shot the doctor in the back, then turned him over and shot him in the face. Apparently the only reason he was killed was for non-payment of the money. About 10 doctors in Punjab have been killed thus—the victims evenly divided between Hindus and Sikhs. Several doctors in private practice in Gurdaspur have moved outside Punjab. Government doctors have got themselves transferred to safer areas of the state. In Bhatinda 12 doctors are under constant threat, and several have actually left. Village school teachers, particularly Hindus have also become favourite targets of the communal terrorists, with 20 killed in Gurdaspur district alone. Annihilation of political opponents : Those who, whether Hindu or Sikh, in any way and for what-ever reasons, oppose the communal terrorists, are targets. Jivan Singh Umranangal, Vice-President of the Akali Dal (Longowal) and himself a veteran of communal politics, began opposing Bhindranwale vocally in 1978. His son Sukhdev was killed iby communal terrorists on May 8 this year. The killers not only shot him in broad daylight but came the next day to attend the funeral. Umranangal’s house has been converted into a near-fortress with armed guards. But other cadre of various political parties, not as rich or influential, continue to be at the mercy of sudden attacks. Ram Lubhaya, the block president of the Congress-I in Dhariwal (Amritsar), was threatened by communal terrorists that if be did not turn over a huge sum his son would be killed. On May 6, 1985, they executed their threat, killing also 2 other persons in the process. Harjit Singh was a vice president of the Akali Youth wing. He and two of his brothers lived in a joint family at Chhoti Jhabal, Amritsar They have a little land. The communal terrorists once came at night, knocked, and called. When they found Harjit Singh was not there, they went away. They came back past midnight on June 13/14. When the family saw the 13 men and their dress, they knew they were terrorists. The visitors had brought a tin of kerosene with them.
The visitors asked for food. So the women started cooking, though it was 12.30. The visitors ate the dinner. ,Then they picked a quarrel with the youngest brother, claiming he was drunk. He denied it, and claimed he never drank. They commanded him to fetch water. As he poured the water, they shot him. They took the double-barrel gun lying in the house and shot Harjit’s father-in-law, Gurdial Singh, with it. Another brother tried to run; they shot him in the back. Harjit was first injured: then he was placed on a cot, doused with kerosene, and set ‘aflame. The killers also set the jeep lying outside on tire, as well as the entire store of grain the family would have consumed during the year. When the team came, it found only vilows aril children. There was not a single man left in the house. The Government has not promised the survivors any assistance, except for an armed guard outside their devastated house. Devinder Dayal, block president of the Janata party in Bhiwani-garb, Sangrur district, was deeply frustrated with all the political parties, including his own. He has a small shop, no land no other property. “I was traditionally a supporter of the Akalis, and in the last election I put all my efforts to help Akalis win, because I thought that then the terrorists would be contained. But the problem has only increased. Whenever political leaders feel they are losing their leader-ship, they take up such issues. It is the politicians who support these communal elements who create problems. But the real situation is: my brothers and I have always kept long hair and beards. My sister is married to a Sikh family. My daughter is married into a Hindu family. Because my father is a Hindu, I cannot tolerate abuse of Hindus. Because I observe Sikh tenets I cannot tolerate abuse of Sikhs. The only reason why these communal incidents occur is because someone wants to make his name as a political leader.”
People’s anger at State terror :
But even as common people are terrified of the communal terrorists, they are equally vociferous about State terror. The people of Kukranwaia, who had suffered at the hands of communal terrorists, were also insistent that the grave excesses by the CRPF on the common people be recorded. Whenever the CRPF arrested an innocent, even those respected elders who went to testify to the arrested man’s good character were beaten. “They (CRPF) are basically cowards,” said one man. “When people went to tell them about the presence of extremists, the CRPF said, we don’t have the force, we won’t come.
They can’t even beat a dog. But they have all the power, so they harrass common people. For example, those who work their fields have to visit the field at night. Then the CRPF men harrass them and interrupt their normal work. CRPF considers every Sikh an extremist.” But it was not only Sikhs who faced the CRPF’s arbitrary wrath. A Scheduled Caste Hindu, Harbhajan Lal, from Kukranwala was coming back from a marriage party on a bus in September 1986. “This bus was stopped at the CRPF check post, we were all made to get down from the bus. Everyone in the marriage party was beaten mercilessly and kicked with boots. I was especially badly beaten by the head constable. I could not move for two months. The CRPF men used filthy abuse. They even went into the bus and mercilessly beat up those inside the bus. To this day I have not understood why they did it, what was their reason.” Gurmeet Singh, Joint state secretary of the CPI (ML) S.N. Singh group, told the team, “Where I live, in village Bhandal, the terrorists killed some members of a Hindu family after Operation Bluestar. All the people of the village helped the family and gave all their sympathy. But when the Army came the next day, they simply assembled the whole village under the sun, and forced them to sit in the scorch-ing sun for three days. At Mustafapur, the Army came during the night, searched all the houses, and, wherever they went, stole gold jewellery and money. There was a complaint of rape, but the parents, worried for their daughter’s marriage, did not pursue it. In Lodhipur village, a youth ran away out of sheer fright when the Army came, and he was simply shot dead.” Gurmeet Singh gave several other instances of such repression on the youth in the villages. “It is the youth of these villages who ran away and hid in Pakistan. After the elections in Punjab, these boys tried to return. One boy who tried to escape from a Pakistani jail was shot by the jail authorities. But escape attempts continued, till the Pakistani authorities finally released them. The youth came back, surrendered, and some of them were rehabilitated but they continue to be marked men, and are harrassed by the BSF and CRPF.” An activist of CPI (ML) C.P. Reddy group said: “Many of the youth who have come back want to re-enter work in the Kirti Kisan Union. But, on the one hand, terrorists keep track of these boys, and on the other most of them are also made to report to the police station daily, despite having surrendered.”
No redress for State terror :
Jut as with killings by the communal terrorists, there is no redress for the killing of innocents by the State. We described earlier how the innocent boy Sain of village Sohl was cold-bloodedly gunned down by the CRPF. They left tire boy’s corpse to the Punjab police, whose duty it is to pick up the bodies the CRPF litters here and there in its hunt for “extremists”. When the police took charge of the body, whoever objected was taken to the police station. Under duress, the police got the thumb marks of relatives on a piece of paper. They handed over the body on the condition that it be immediately cremated, which it was. But word spread among the surrounding villages, and with it anger. From a number of villages. about 200 women and 600 men gathered and marched to Amritsar to the SSP, Izhar Alam. They demanded immediate action against the culprits. Alam replied: “I understand your feelings. I know the boy was innocent. But we have very complicated laws. We can’t take action against the CRPF.” There were two options. he said. The people could press for an enquiry: or the bereaved family could take some unofficial “help”, ie, Rs. 25,000. He advised the latter course. “The lass,” he assured them, “is against you, because the boy, after all, was running away.” The deputation was confused. The people at first wanted to press for an enquiry, but after discussing for some time among them-selves they finally relented. They decided to ask that. besides whatever “compensation” was paid to the family, the SSP assure them that the CRPF would not shoot running men on mere suspicion. They explained that, in farming, one frequently has to run through the fields even at night—for example, when the electricity comes on, a farmer runs to turn on the pump. Alam magnanimously promised to write to the CRPF not to shoot running men on mere suspicion. The promised money, of course, has never been paid. Nor can the villagers set much store by the other promises made. State machinery as criminal gang: Just as the communal terrorists, in the overall garb of protecting the Sikh religion, carry on extortion, electoral politicking. and criminal activities, as too the State machinery, in the present circumstances, has been given license to terrorize for private ends. A common complaint is that arrests are made on suspicion, and the arrested are only released upon payment of large sums by their families. In April, at Latala village, Ludhiana, an individual, with the connivance of the Station House Officer of Dahlon Police Station raised a construction on panchayat land. This was resisted by the panchayat. In response, the SHO brought a large police contingent and brutally attacked the whole village, rounding up and beating the residents indiscriminately. The fact finding team got a taste of arbitrary police action in Tarn Taran. The police stopped the rented Matador van in which we were travelling. An officer informed us that the police would require the van for the next two months, and that we had to leave it with him. We tried to convince him, pointing out that the van had been rented in another district and the driver had been hired along with the van. We also told him that we were an all-India fact-finding team investigating the Punjab situation. “So you’ll stay longer, you can find out more,” he replied. It required considerable time, the intervention of a person who knew the officers of the police station, and the emphasis that journalists among the team might “carry a bad impression in their writings,” to get the van released One can imagine what would be the fate of common people in such a situation.
Unpublicized murders : One particularly shocking fact needs publicity, as it has not been reported in the press widely. The encounter deaths that are taking place at the border are indeed cold-blooded murders of innocents, though by and large not in the manner that Sikh communal forces make them out to be. The sheer number is remarkable. For example, for the period between April and October, 1986, the chief of the Border Security Force provided a figure of 249 such -encounter” deaths. The majority of those who die in these encounters, even by the BSF’s admission, are not terrorists. At the time of Partition in 1947, a large number of Urdu-speaking Bihari Muslims migrated to East Pakistan (Bangladesh). Facing persecution in that Bengali speaking country, thousands of these destitutes migrate every year in whole families across India and attempt to enter Pakistan. A few find work in India along the way; many manage to get into Pakistan; and the remainder are killed at the border by our BSF. There is no question of such families carrying arms and firing back at the BSF; so why are they shot down? Can these by any stretch of the imagination be called deaths in “encounter”, a term which means that there is exchange of fire? In fact, the absurdity of this claim sheds doubt on all the other cases of deaths in encounter at the border. For their part, Sikh communalists do not bring out the facts regarding the nationality of the majority of those who die in these border “encounters”, and publicise only the cases of Sikhs who die in such encounters. The State machinery’s practice of maintaining silence over its doings only aids this communal propaganda. The fact of the matter—viz, that the State machinery is not only anti-Sikh but anti-people—will, of course, not be disclosed by either the State or the communalists.
A further example of State repression which fuels communal propaganda is the continued detention in Jodhpur jail of innocent pilgrims arrested at the time of “Operation Bluestar”. The government has as yet, three years later, not tried these innocent men and women, whom it accuses of “waging war against the State”. If they are indeed dangerous terrorists, why not try them in the courts? If they are not, is it not grotesquely unjust to have kept them in illegal captivity for three whole years, without any means of redress? At the same time, it is significant that even those Jodhpur detenues who were well-known office-bearers of Khalistani organisations such as the AISSF have not been prosecuted, although there are ample grounds for doing so. So, in some future deal which the government may strike with one or the other faction of the Akalis or Khalistanis, not only the innocent detenues but the guilty too may be released in a “general amnesty”. In effect, the detenues have become a bargaining chip in the Centre’s strategy. And till the guilty are released in a package deal, the innocents will have to wait in jail.
Brahmpura : a case study : How communal propaganda and State repression build on one another’s actions is exemplified by incidents in Brahmpura village, Amritsar district, where there is a CRPF check post. Late at night on December 27, 1986, a very well-known communal terrorist, Avtar Singh Brahma, obtained, at gunpoint, the use of the public address system in the village. From the public address system he openly taunted the CRPF, made provocative statements, and gave the slogan “Khalistan Zindabad”. All this time the CRPF unit posted in the school building listened, but did not move an inch. Only after Brahma left, taking his own time, did this paramilitary force come into action. Then the CRPF raided the village. It forced every household to open its doors. Whoever came in the CRPF men’s path was beaten severely, abused, and accused of sheltering Brahma. All the men of the village were rounded up and taken to the school compound in the icy cold, although they were dressed only in their nightwear. Some women were also molested by the CRPF men (thought not raped, as a section of the Press motivatedly reported). One old man died from injuries inflicted by the CRPF. Significantly, Hindu families, too, including those of a teacher and a veterinarian, were also assaulted. Later, communal forces made full use of the entire incident. Hindu Shiv Sena leaders, without even attempting to visit the village, issued a statement justifying the CRPF action. The Sikh communalists, for their part, seized upon the incident to revive their flagging popularity. Various Akali leaders and Darshan Singh Ragi visited the site. It was only after Ragi’s mammoth public meeting at Brahmpura that he became known as a political leader with a “mass following”. Ragi focussed particularly on the allegation that the copy of Guru Granth Sahib had been burnt in the gurudwara by the CRPF. Actually, there was no proof to show that the CRPF had burnt this copy, and it seems possible that the burning was carried out later to arouse religious sentiments and to substantiate the Sikh communalists’ claim that the issue was one of persecution of Sikhs. Actually, the focus on the burning of the Granth diverted attention from the fact of the CRPF’s brutal attack on all the villagers, whether Sikh or Hindu. In the incident at Brahmpura we can see vividly (i) how the State. machinery in Punjab is unwilling to take on communal terrorists (ii) how it instead assaults innocent common people, including Hindus who cross its path; (iii) how advantage is taken of such repression by Sikh communalists, who try to convert it into a Hindu-Sikh issue.
Common Hindus and Sikhs maintain harmony in villages : In village after village, the team found that there was remark-able communal harmony. One cannot expect, in any village in the rest of India, to have Hindus and Muslims freely and amicably talk together to a team of outsiders about communal killings of either community. Yet what we found, in even villages worst affected by communal and State terror, is that Hindus and Sikhs freely sat together and discussed with us the incidents. We did not notice any sign of tension or even differing versions in the majority of the places we visited. Where Hindu families had planned to migrate, the entire village came out to persuade them to stay. Even in the case of those who eventually did migrate, they were clear that it was not due to any hostility from their Sikh neighbours. In the rural areas, Sikh constitute 80-90 per cent of the population. So, if there were any real communal tension or warfare, one might expect to see mass killings of Hindus. Yet the fact is that not a single mob incident was reported from any village in Punjab. Hindus attend Sikhs’ marriages and functions and Sikhs attend those of Hindus; and their practices are similar. Hindus in several areas grow beards and wear turbans purely as a matter of custom. Even in villages where Hindus make up a tiny percentage of the population, they were well represented in the panchayats. In villages of Pathankot tehsil, which were overwhelmingly Hindu, Sikhs are well represented in the panchayats. Secular forces can, with effort, take this even further: For example, in some villages where the Kirti Kisan Union is active, a joint committee of Hindus and Sikhs administers both temples and gurudwaras. Similarly in virtually all places we visited, we found that common peasants strongly disapproved of killings of innocents, and felt that those who committed such murders were bad men. Harbhajan Singh, a farmer near Nakodar, told us. “In any village where a Hindu is attacked, it is Sikhs who take the boy to the hospital, Sikhs who cremate the body, and Sikhs who mourn.” It is definitely possible, with the concerted effort of secular forces, to convert this passive feeling into an active defence by the people against such attacks.
Fatchbad :
However, the team did notice certain specific areas of tension. First, among the villages the only one with marked communal tension was Fatehbad in Tarn Taran tehsil of Amritsar. It has a population of about 7-8 thousand. There is a larger Hindu population here than in most villages, perhaps totalling 38 per cent. Here, as the team began discussion in an open place, Hindus and Sikhs gave sharply contrasting versions. Sikhs said that hardly 4-5 per cent of the Hindus
