The problem in Punjab has roots in false narrative not being challenged
“Those who tell the stories rule the world.”
(Hopi American Indian proverb)
This quote was used by this author in his article on power of narrative . The present situation in Punjab is the failure of government after government in defeating the narrative created by separatist over a period of time. Until the war on narratives is settled, divisive forces sitting outside India will keep instigating youth eager to immigrate. The tragedy is instigators are enjoying and ordinary people including true guruSikhs are suffering. These sufferings which were caused by the dirty politics of separatist, then used to create a new negative narrative. Before examining the facts let’s understand the philosophy of first Sikh guru Nanak Dev Ji. As soon as Guruji understood the true meaning of spirituality he took 5 long pilgrimages called ‘udasi’ in all the four directions. He travelled more than 28000 kilometers, mostly on foot He visited religious places of all the faiths, debated the doctrine and spread the true message of love. One has to remember the dangers he faced and the lack of resources. All the ten gurus spread the message through exceptional sacrifices and unmatchable humility. To the contrary present Sikh leadership which controls hundreds of gurudwaras with huge money and public support, having large administrative infrastructure and trained granthis is just doing the opposite, not a single granthi goes to unknown people spreading the gospel. It’s a shame that the land of gurus has become favourite place for conversion mafia. What preset Sikh leadership is promoting now, is a campaign to control a small part of India exclusively. As a result Sikhism is facing a great challenge where the leaders are failing to teach this great message to their own children and missionaries are making inroads in their so-called controlled territory.
KPS Gill who defeated the terror infrastructure in Punjab and brought back normalcy wrote,“The entire structure and leadership that gave rise to Sikh Fundamentalism, and eventually to terrorism, in the decades since independence is still in place. Worsestill, the logic that fuelled the events of the Seventies and the Eighties has not even been confronted.This logic is integrally linked with fundamental aspects of modern democracies [particularly in culturally and religiously diverse societies such as India] and specifically with the problems of the creation and cultivation of communal ‘vote banks’ which distort political, economic and developmental goals.”
The narrative talks and honours the terrorists but never discusses the plight of victims who were killed or were forced to shift their business outside Punjab. It never explains why Punjab is a laggard on many counts of development. Why Sikhs who have reached every part of the world and earned both wealth and honour,are unemployed, frustrated and eager to immigrate from their own land, where they are a majority and had 100 percent Sikh chief ministers. Why they cry foul and projects themselves as victims despite having everything needed.
Seeking US asylum claiming racial discrimination in india.
Every year few Indian Sikh apply for US asylum claiming racial discrimination. Some get it but no Indian government ever objected to this propaganda assuming it is a simple fast forward exercise to get U.S citizenship but it creates an authentic proof of fake discrimination. The author is sure that most of the readers may not be knowing this fact. The data given on a website (worlddata.info) indicate that 3436,1705 and 1125 Indians applied for asylum in U.S, Canada and U.K respectively. These people project themselves as victims of state persecution. It is a shame that these persons claim to be persecuted by the governments which were always headed by Sikh chief minister. India has never objected to Sikhs seeking asylum but diffrent papers have tried to explain the facts;
“The theory of economic considerations rather than political or religious persecution as real ground for seeking asylum is also subscribed to by people like Dinesh Dhakal, a former Harvard economics lecturer who is a senior fellow at Duke Center for International Development. He said that in most cases such asylum-seekers are economic migrants to the U.S.”( By Suman Guha Mozumder Jun 30, 2018 Updated Jul 1, 2018 indiaabroad.com)
The point is when India will respond?
Projecting Sikhs as savior of Hindus eliminating the contribution of Hindus in promoting and protecting Sikh religion.
Many Hindu political leaders also repeat this narrative which is dangerous for the simple reason that Hindus were never separated themselves.The fact is Sikh gurus were preaching reforms and they themselves were Hindu till Great Guru Govind Singh Ji established Khalsa Panth. It is to be remembered that the word Panth was used, As a result Hindu families comfortably encouraged their eldest son to be a guru Sikh ( disciple of the guru). It was a joint fight against the cruelty of Islamic invaders. One of the missions to free Ram Janm Bhumi was led by Guru Gobind Singh Ji, Is the proof. Moreover as per report published in DNA “The tenth Guru came to Nanded in 1708, to seek Maratha support to fight the Mughal Empire that was then under Aurangzeb, after his glorious victories in the Anandpur Saheb, Sarsa and Chamkaur wars.”
(Jaideep Hardikar Nov 19, 2013, 11:17 PM IST). It may surprise many readers but the fact is Marathas and Sikh fought together to oust Afghan control over Sirhind and Amritsar. It is worth reminding that Marathas had no interest in Punjab; they were only responding to requests received from Sikh generals. As a result despite winning war the alliance committed lots of mistakes, including not crossing Sindhu river, allowing Afghan to survive,not appointing son of soil Sikhs as rulers, not taking the control over delhi, however prisoners were taken to Amritsar to clean swarn mandir,
“An unusual alliance of the Marathas, Mughals under Adina Beg and the Dal Khalsa (Sikh confederation) under Jassa Singh Ahluwalia attacked and captured Sirhind on March 21,1758…..The allies then marched to Lahore. The city was abandoned by the Afghans to the “Indian alliance”……The prisoners were marched by the Sikhs to Amritsar to clean the Golden Temple sarovar where dead cows and excreta had been dumped earlier by Jehan Khan.
(April 1, 2018, 8:18 AM IST Lt General H S Panag in Shooting Straight, India, TOI)
The narrative set by these power mongers has eliminated all the contributions of Hindus and projected them as the villain. They find comfort in sitting in the lap of ISI.
Despite having principles of humility, bravery and the spirit to serve humanity, how has this aggression come?
Canada and England based separatists have created this narrative, Akalis who started as amazing satyagrahis against British atrocities which earned praise from pandit Madan Mohan Malviya and Mahatma Gandhi. Madan Mohan Malviya even requested Hindus to encourage their elder son to join the movement. It is sad that Akalis lost their path midway due to greed for power. Master Tara singh expressed his anguish on this losing the core values of sikhi.
“Our victory in the morcha (agitation) to obtain the keys of the Toshakhana had puffed up our ego sky-high. Our Jathas would travel any class by train without ticket. We started insulting British officers without cause. Such fire was being emitted in speeches as led later to irresponsibility and indiscipline among our ranks. Everybody became a law unto himself.“
Post independence when they were not able to win the combined Punjab they agitated and forced the central government to separate the states of Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, to their surprise they could not win that even,despite having Sikhs as majority in the state. Then onwards they promoted victim theory.
From then onwards Akalis have mastered the skill of exploiting democracy. When in power they strengthen their infrastructure and when out of power they agitate, demand of Sikh suba, Anandpur sahib resolutio, blocking of Asian games of 1982, and farmers agitation is the proof. Despite claiming to be the spokespersons of Sikh community they have failed to get the support of the majority of Sikhs and lost the trust of Hindus in the bargain. They used to come to power as a result of the failure of congress. Congress on the other hand promoted hard core Bhindaravale to marginalize Akalis. Bhinderwale did not take much time to outgrow the both and the rest is known as the darkest part of Punjab history. The hatred and terror that followed will remain a shame forever. Despite the failure of congress last year Akalis have lost power to the Aam Aadmi party which offered more lucrative freebies.
The tragedy of our nation is that all reformist political movements have failed due to over ambition of their leaders, the Gandhian work has been destroyed by the power hungry corrupt politicians of congress and same is the fate of Akalis, the alliance partner BJP kept looking the other way ignoring the construction of bhindranwale memorial and the rumors of udta Punjab. Anna Hazare must be feeling defeated with the acts the AAP leadership he promoted inadvertently.
Exclusion of Sahajdhari Sikhs
Originally Sikhs were represented by Amrit dhari and sahaj dhari, however the hard core elements have marginalized the sahajdhari. The process of alienation has been completed by with President Pranab Mukherjee giving assent to a bill passed by Parliament. Accordingly Those who trim or shave beard and hair, smoke or drink alcohol cannot vote in the elections to Sikh religious bodies. Bhagwant maan of AAP and captain Amarinder singh opposed the move saying it will exclude thousands of sahaj dhari sikhs. The sad part is that sahajdhari were able to win the battle in court but lost to political manipulation.
“Union home minister Rajnath Singh said the demand for not giving voting rights to Sehajdari Sikhs was made by the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC) that “often demanded that those who are not Sikhs should not be given [the] voting rights”. After partition of Punjab the hard liners have successfully eliminated the sahajdhari. It is irony that drinking and smoking can not be proved instantly. The only thing which can be proved is trimming of hair. If it is implemented in letter and spirit present CM of Punjab and many genuine sikh will not be able to vote.
It is painful that a learned Rajnath singh Ji could not understand that his party has helped the hard liner against the verdicts of court and inadvertently narrowed down the spread of Sikh teachings.
This is how Akalis are using democracy! It took them no time to break their association from BJP on a non issue of farmers bill as Punjab farmers were already doing contract farming for potato crops.
Foreign hand
In 1857 Sikhs fought to save the East India company from the powerful revolt as a result Britishers understood the importance. Imperialism thrives on divisions and it sowed such divisions to ensure their continued power over the people. “The British government invited E. Trumpp, a German Indologist, to look at Sikh scriptures and prove that their theology and cosmology were different from those of the Vedas and the Upanishads.” April 21,2021,Manu kohli in indiafacts.org.in But he found nothing in them to support this view, in fact Nanak teaching are the nirakar Upasana, he used ‘Ek aunakar’ his son baba sri Chand propagated udasi Panth which thrives on prayer on form as well as without form. His two famous disciples Bala and mardana were Hindu and Muslim only and he did not convert any.
He did the last rites of mardana as per Muslim rituals only. However to please his clients E trump wrote that if Sikh loses his hair he may merge in hindus and there fore there is a great danger to Sikhism from Hinduism.
Britishers moved forward to declare Sikh as a religion that too a minority. Then onwards the British promoted division, full details may expand this article into a fulll book. Then onwards some Sikhs settled in Britain started rewriting Sikh history with a motive to separate the community from it Hindu lineage. Canada based Sikh joined later and post 1971 Bangladesh formation gave Pakistan a dream to separate Punjab from india on similar lines. This deadly combination is leaving no stone unturned.Indian government has also helped inadvertently by eliminating sahajdhari from the gurudwara prabandhak committee elections.
Consequences
Air india flight 182 disintegrated in mid-air en route from Montreal to London, at an altitude of 31,000 feet (9,400 m) over the Atlantic Ocean, as a result of an explosion from a bomb planted by Canadian Sikh terrorists on 23 June 1985 all passengers died. After lot of delays and denial, in 2006 Canada appointed the former Supreme Court Justice John C. Major to conduct a commission of inquiry. His report, which was completed and released on 17 June 2010, concluded that a “cascading series of errors” by the Government of Canada, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) had allowed the terrorist attack to take place.
(CBC News (17 June 2010). “Air India case marred by ‘inexcusable’ errors”. CBC. Archived from the original on 19 June 2010. Retrieved 22 June 2010.)
These three countries indirectly provide shelter and resources to conduct such activities.
Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau on his first official visit to India got a cold shoulder welcome as his government is enabling pro-Khalistan elements?
Way forward
Indian forces and intelligence are capable of crushing any attempt to destabilize the peace however these forces can not write content and manage propaganda war. To counter instigation of Indian citizens. The country has seen during the CAA and farmer protests, how internal anti national elements can hurt! This propaganda machinery has tibe defeated by Indian media and our selfish greedy politicians. This is where the problem lies.The ruling party has displayed exemplary restrain in handling the situation during CAA and Farmers agitation.
Strong action needed urgently
- Elimination of illegal funding
- Curtailing drug mafia and smuggling of contraband’s.
- Controlling conversion drive in Punjab ( enough laws are available)
- Using a strong hand of law to set right trouble makers.
Enough resources are available to deal with these elements what is needed is a strong will, missing in political parties.
Recently a police station was attacked, wounding policemen and consequently taking away the person held by police. Former DGP Punjab police Julio Reberio claimed that a good opportunity to bottle up Khalistan’s advocate Amritpal Singh has been lost and it will demoralize the police force. One can compare this incident with murder of DIG police A.S Atwal who was shot dead at the gates of Swarn Mandir while his guards ran away along with Punjab armed police force. The extremist danced around the dead body.
Can one take a sigh of relief that india of 2023 is different?
Only time will tell!
