Stop stoking this hatred

The Sikh community, led by the jathedars, will observe June 6 as 8216;Ghalughara Divas8217; all over the world. My estimate after collecti...

The Sikh community, led by the jathedars, will observe June 6 as 8216;Ghalughara Divas8217; all over the world. My estimate after collecting all information is that about 1,000-1,200 persons died at the hands of the Indian army.

It is intriguing that such a commemoration began only last year, when J.S. Bhindranwale was declared dead and a martyr. It is said that 7,000 to 8,000 Sikhs lost their lives at the hands of Diwan Lakhpat Rai Kapur and 30,000 lives were killed in February 1762, in a massacre perpetrated by Ahmed Shah Abdali. I am not aware if any of these days are observed at a mass level. It is important to revisit the Indira Gandhi era to gain an understanding of that period. When the Akalis had been driven out of power by Indira Gandhi, they first launched a morcha against water being given to Haryana. A separate morcha was launched by Bhindranwale for the release of his associates. Both the morchas soon lost steam. This was when they were combined into a 8216;Dharam Yudh Morcha8217; and shifted to the Golden Temple Complex.

Bhindranwale and his killer gangs started operating from Guru Nanak Niwas. Some individual Sikhs took exception to this but neither at the level of the community, nor at the level of organisations like the SAD or SGPC, were efforts made to rein him in. When the late G.S. Tohra challenged the government to provide proof of Bhidranwale8217;s complicity, I wrote to S.S. Barnala, under whom I had worked, to persuade the Akalis to address the issue. I was sure that the Sikh community would pay a heavy price for their inability to see through Bhindranwale. I was also convinced that Indira Gandhi was sympathetic toward the Sikhs 8212; she just did not want the Akalis to get any political mileage. She tried mediation through many Sikh luminaries and, at one point of time, an agreement seemed almost in sight.

She continued her efforts to defuse the situation right up to June 3. Some accuse her of insincerity 8212; there is evidence that the army had conducted mock exercises to storm the Golden Temple complex. This doesn8217;t by itself indicate her duplicity. The army would have identified threat perceptions and prepared to meet them.

Subsequent events show that Mrs Gandhi did not anticipate Sikh anger over the army action. Since General Sunderji was authorised to carry out Operation Blue Star, it was his duty to see that it was conducted quickly and with the least loss of life. The army failed to do this. It also failed to choose the right day to conduct it 8212; it being gurupurab. But the biggest mistake, certainly, was the dependence on stun gas to flush out Bhindrawale and his associates from the Akal Takht. The AK-47s and SLRs held by his supporters trained by General Sahbeg Singh had a much longer range than that of the stun gas guns, and the latter were of little use.

The brutal massacre that followed involved mostly pilgrims. The army failed to provide timely relief to them nor did it allow others to render such service. I am convinced that all this was not on the directions of Mrs Gandhi 8212; but she did not think it fit to make any scapegoats for an operation that went horribly wrong. The Akalis and jathedars need to stop stoking the fires of hatred against her and the Congress in order to gain political mileage from the great tragedy that befell the Sikhs in 1984.

The writer is a former chief secretary of Punjab