Journalism of Courage
DAYS after it issued orders to remove pictures of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and Beant Singh murder convict Jagtar Singh Hawara from its buses, calling them terrorists, the state-run PEPSU Road Transport Corporation (PRTC) on Monday revoked the same.
The order had led to protests by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC), Akali Dal (Amritsar), Dal Khalsa and other Sikh bodies. Akali Dal (A) workers staged a protest in front of the PRTC head office in Patiala on Monday, while Dal Khalsa activists had clashed with the Punjab Police while trying to put up Bhindranwale posters on PEPSU buses.
With the issue giving the Opposition another handle against the AAP government, which is being painted as “outsider (read Delhi) run”, and afraid of the issue blowing up, the Bhagwant Mann government appears to have backtracked.
Pictures of both Bhindranwale and Hawara are common in the public domain in Punjab.
On June 28, the office of Additional Director of Police (Law and Order) issued a letter to all SSPs and commissioners in the state cautioning that the pictures of Bhindranwale and Hawara could be used to attack the government or to hold protests outside PRTC offices. The letter specifically mentioned registration numbers of three buses – based in Sangrur, Barnala and Bathinda — which carried such pictures.
After the SGPC criticised the letter, State Transport Minister Laljit Singh Bhullar expressed ignorance about it. “There is no such letter in my knowledge. Opposition parties are spreading fake propaganda,” he told reporters on July 2.
Then, on July 6, the Nodal Officer, Grievances, PRTC issued a letter seeking removal of pictures of Bhindranwale and Hawara. The letter said: “It has come to my notice through social media that PRTC-run buses have pictures of terrorist Jagtar Hawara and Jarnail Bhindranwale, and objectionable material is written, which may affect the law and order situation in the state… pictures should be removed before that.”
Following this, the pictures of Bhindranwale and Hawara were removed from at least two buses mentioned in the police letter.
In the July 11 order taking back the original directive, the Nodal Officer said some religious organisations had said the move hurt their sentiments. “So the letter is revoked.”
The pictures of Bhindanwale, who occupied the Golden Temple and was killed during Army’s Operation Blue Star in 1984, can be seen across Punjab — on T-shirts, vehicles, as well as with Bhagat Singh and B R Ambedkar. The Akal Takht had declared him a martyr and displays his picture at the Central Sikh Museum. Popular Punjabi songs also frequently make a mention of him.
During the agitation against the farm laws, Bhindranwale’s pictures were put up by protesters on tractors.
Hawara, convicted for the assassination of former CM Beant Singh, was declared the Akal Takht Jathedar at a ‘Sarbat Khalsa’ event organised by Sikh bodies opposed to the Akali Dal (Badal) in 2015. Former MP Dhian Singh Mand was appointed acting jathedar for the time he was in jail.
As they raised the heat on the Akali Dal (Badal) government over sacrilege issues, the Congress and AAP had both courted Sarbat Khalsa leaders, who back Hawara. Former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh too held regular correspondence with Dhian Singh Mand, despite being grilled by him over alleged inaction in sacrilege cases.
Recently, the AAP government was accused of giving a clean chit to the Akali Dal (Badal) in the sacrilege cases after the SIT report laid the blame for the same on the Dera Sacha Sauda.
