1984 – The year that changed India

Tel Aviv [ENA] After the assassination of Indira Gandhi on 31 October 1984 anti-Sikh pogroms errupted in India. The destruction of the Golden Temple and the violence against Sikhs is burned deep into the soul of the Sikh community and marks a turning point in the history of Sikhism and in India´s history. Decades passed and there was no justice for the victims: this is the unending tragedy of 1984.

Indira Gandhi was India´s prime minister and she literally inherited her office from her father Jawaharlal Nehru. During her authoritarian leadership, corruption was the order of the day – and this was not the only infamous thing: she suspended democracy for two years, jailing political opponents. She declared a sterilization campaign where millions of Indians were forcibly sterilized, she gave huge amounts of Indian taxpayer´s money for killing jews in Israel and it was her and her governments wickedness which led to the murder of thousands of Sikhs.

She launched “Operation Blue Star” to raid the Harmandir Sahib, also known as Golden Temple, the central sanctuary of the Sikh faith to get rid of the religious Sikh leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his followers. Countless Sikhs were murdered or simply “disappeared”. The supporters of Indira Gandhi's ruling Congress party led mobs who murdered Sikhs across India. Then the Western media failed to question Indira Gandhi, her son Rajiv Gandhi or Congress, the party responsible for the violence, for their misconducts instead they referred to Sikhs as a “militant sect”.

Sikhism is the youngest world religion and is based on the teachings of Guru Nanak, the first Guru and the nine Sikh gurus that succeeded him. It is a monotheistic religion that originated in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent in the 15th century. Sikhism rejects the worship of idols or cult images, superstitions and a caste system and promotes equality between men and women. Cutting hair and the consumption of alcohol, tobacco or any type of (non-medical) drugs are forbidden. The Dastaar, the turban is considered an integral part of the unique Sikh identity. Throughout their history Sikhs were persecuted for their faith.

Since the martyrdom of the fifth Sikh Guru, Guru Arjan in 1606, the peaceful Sikhs have known the need of self-defense and the use of arms. The Khalsa order was created in 1699 by the last human Sikh Guru, Guru Gobind Singh and abolished existing social divisions. The Khalsa made them a kind of Saint Soldiers and was designated to oppose tyranny or any other form of injustice. In the early eighteenth century, Sikhism was outlawed by the Mughal rulers. Thousands of Sikhs were tortured and killed. After the fall of the Mughals, the Sikh Empire was established. It was a strong, multireligious and multinational state.

The British fought two bloody wars to defeat the Sikh Empire. After the First Sikh War, the Punjab has been annexed, after the Second Sikh War, the state was fully incorporated into British India. The last well-organized Indian state was extinguished, and the fairy-tale treasures of the Sikhs were plundered and abducted. After the second Sikh War, the British began recruiting them because of their fighting skills. From then on, Sikhs fought on the battlefields of the British Empire. In 1917 they freed under the command of General Allenby the city of Jerusalem and in 1918 two Sikh-Battalions liberated Haifa.

The partition of India in 1947 made millions of Sikhs homeless. The central government promised the Sikh leaders and the Sikh population to guarantee their rights and freedoms within the new constitution but it never happened. Already Mahatma Gandhi wanted the Sikhs to renounce parts of their religion and culture, so that they can be reabsorbed into Hinduism, for example he wanted them to use the Devnagri script, not the Gurmukhi script. The “Father of the Nation” Gandhi insisted on referring to Sikhs as "Hindus".

Sikh leaders tried to negotiate more autonomy for the Punjab and pleaded that Article 25 of the Indian Constitution should be corrected. This article summarizes Sikhs, Buddhists, and other believers as "Hindus", even that Buddhism as well as Sikhism are completely different and independent religions. In 1973, the Sikh party, Akali Dal passed the Anandpur Resolution. The Resolution demanded more autonomy for the Punjab and it included among other things the demand for recognizing Sikhism as separate religion from Hinduism. The Central Government denied the demands.

Later in 1975 Indira Gandhi, the woman with the skunk-striped hair declared a state of emergency over India when she was convicted of electoral fraud. According to the court order, she had to go to jail. She didn´t. Demonstrations were organized and people were arrested without warrants, many of them Sikhs. The resistance intensified after Indira Gandhi instructed to divert water from the Punjab to the surrounding states, while the Punjab was ordered to pay for their own water, whereas the surrounding states received the water for free. Numerous protest movements were initiated under the leadership of various Sikh representatives, including Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, a so-called militant Sikh leader.

Attempts were made by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to prop up Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale to undermine the Akali Dal, a Sikh religious political party. A part of the Sikhs turned to militancy in the Punjab. Bhindranwale criticized the central government's minority policy, the behavior of some Sikh leaders and he founded a movement to uphold the Sikh identity. Bhindranwale advocated to avoid the state-funded anti-Sikh groups, such as the Nirankari sect and aimed to create an independent Sikh-state called Khalistan. Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale gained enormous popularity and became a central figure in the Sikh community.

In late 1983 Indira Gandhi took the rising tensions in the Punjab as an excuse to impose President's rule in the Punjab. In India, the president's rule is the suspension of state government and imposition of direct central government rule in a state. After increasing confrontation with the central government Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his closest companions relocated their headquarters in December 1983 in an annex of the Sri Akaal Takht, the highest seat of temporal Sikh authority. On 1, June Indira Gandhi ordered the army to launch a military action, code name “Operation Blue Star” to remove Bhindranwale and his followers from the Temple complex.

A curfew was imposed on the state of Punjab: Complete media censorship was enforced, the electricity supply was interrupted and created a total blackout and cutting off the state of the rest of the world. There were thousands of pilgrims in the Sikh sanctuary at the time to commemorate one of the most important holidays, the martyrdom of Guru Arjan Dev. All pilgrims and visitors were allowed into the Sri Darbar complex, but no one was allowed to leave. The armed Sikhs within the Harmandir Sahib, the Golden Temple were led by Bhindranwale, former Maj. Gen. Shabeg Singh, and Amrik Singh, the President of the All India Sikh Students Federation.

The army had completely underestimated the firepower of Bhindranwale and his followers. The storming killed thousands of innocent civilians, including women, children, elderly people, Sri Darbar Sahib staff, and Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his associates. The Sri Akaal Takht, as well as the Darshani Deuri, where important historical manuscripts and objects were preserved were almost completely destroyed. After June 6, 1984, the Sikh Reference Library (Sikh Library) was looted and set on fire by the Indian Army. Valuable books, manuscripts were previously transported away. The rest was set on fire. The news of the military operation spread despite the curfew and caused worldwide dismay and mass protests in the Sikh community.

On October 31, 1984, Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her two Sikh bodyguards Beant Singh and Satwant Singh – according the official version. In the aftermath of her death her son Rajiv Gandhi took office. He didn´t become the father of the Indian nation but the father of the mob lynching. He gave a free run to rape- and killer gangs. Across India agitators spat deadly venom, calling the slogan ‘Khoon Ka Badla Khoon’ what means ´Blood for Blood´. As a result, cruel attacks on the Sikh population in many parts of India escalated. The killings were organized and supervised by parts of the government.

Over the next days, thousands of Sikhs were tortured and killed, women and girls were gang-raped, Sikh property was marked with paint, so mobs knew what to loot and to burn. Independent sources estimate the number of murdered Sikhs at about 8,000–17,000 and more than 100,000 rape victims. Innumerable Sikhs were “disappeared” by security forces- the whereabouts are still unknown. “When a big tree falls, the earth shakes,” said Rajiv Gandhi to justify the Sikh-Genozid. In the coming years he crushed down the Sikh resistance. A functioning judicial and legal system is basic for maintaining and ensuring the democratic order, but for the Sikh community it did not work out: this is the unending tragedy of 1984.

Decades passed and there was no justice for the victims: files disappeared and the state failed to prosecute those most responsible for the anti-Sikh violence. The government allegedly destroyed evidence and shielded the guilty. Ten commissions or committees have been created to investigate the riots. Most of the accused were acquitted or never formally charged. In December 2018 six perpetrators of the 1984 Sikh Genocide were sentenced by the Supreme Court to life imprisonment. The judges declared that the Sikh killings in New Delhi and elsewhere in November 1984 were “crimes against humanity”.

The Sikhs have neither forgotten nor forgiven Indira Gandhi and her son Rajiv. Bhindranwale is still a Sikh icon, 35 years after his death in Operation Bluestar. Non-Sikhs regard Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his movement as extremists, responsible for the launching the Sikh Militancy. He has remained a controversial figure in India. But it was Indira Gandhi´s and Rajiv Gandhi´s massive wrongdoing which caused the loss of so many lives. 35 years later justice still seems not even half done. The state must provide compensation and justice to the victims of Operation Bluestar and the 1984 anti-Sikh pogroms. Time doesn't heal the pain but justice can ease the pain a little bit.