Why Sikhs Rebelled

[Guest guest]

By Colonel Anil A Athale

http://us.rediff.com/news/2004/jun/10spec1.htm?

headline=Why~Osama~resembles~Bhindranwale

On the eve of the 1971 war between India and Pakistan, I was posted

in Punjab. My battalion of Gorkhas was located at Ambala and had the

task of defending a section of the border north of Amritsar.

 

I had never been to the Golden Temple and took the first opportunity

to visit the shrine. Being a compulsive smoker, I had a packet of

cigerettes on me. At the entrance itself I was told to deposit the

packet in the locker and then go ahead.

 

During my first visit to this holiest Sikh shrine, I heard the

shabad kirtan (devotional songs) being sung from the first floor of

the Harmandir Sahib. Being an avid fan of Indian classical music,

for me it was a treat to listen to some of the finest music, that

too free.

 

>From this time onwards, whenever I was passing through Amritsar I

made it a point to visit the Golden Temple and spend some time

there. It was always a rewarding experience.

 

It was quite common to see, at that time, that Hindu visitors to the

Golden Temple far outnumbered Sikhs on a normal day. In my army days

most of my close friends were Sikhs and therefore one was quite

familiar with Sikh rituals and often visited gurdwaras as a matter

of course on Sundays.

 

But less than 13 years later, I found myself again in Punjab, this

time on the unpleasant duty of dealing with terrorists who thought

that pulling out Hindus from buses and gunning them down mercilessly

was their highest religious duty. As a participant in the painful

but necessary Operation Bluestar, I can vouch that when General K

Sundarji said that the Indian Army entered the Golden Temple with a

prayer on its lips, he echoed the sentiments of all of us.

 

Today, when the memory of those nightmare years seems distant, there

is an attempt to give a very different colour to the whole episode.

Gulzar did that quite effectively with his film Maachis. The tragic

consequences of that were seen in the suicide of a Sikh police

officer (former Tarn Taran superintendent of police A S Sandhu) who

had dealt with terrorism. It is therefore time for all Indians to

understand the truth that led to a ten-year bloodbath in Punjab and

not attempt to glorify the terrorists under the garb of human rights.

 

Most analysts agree that the troubles in Punjab began with the

Nirankari-Sikh clash that took place on April 13, 1978, in Amritsar.

The Nirankaris are a heretic cult that violates the basic tenets of

Sikhism and yet claims to be part of the Panth. Forty protesters

died in that clash and a feeling spread that the government was

supporting the Nirankaris. It is noteworthy that at that time Punjab

was being ruled by the Akalis. The violent movement that began

initially as an anti-Nirankari agitation soon turned against the

government and, later, Hindus.

 

The origins of the Punjab crisis and Sikh separatism go back to the

British days. As in the case of Muslims, giving Sikhs a separate

identity, not religious but political, was a part of the divide and

rule policy. But the trauma of the partition of Punjab did much to

wash off that myth and the Sikhs returned to the Indian mainstream.

 

The Akalis often used the slogan of 'Sikh Panth in danger' (not

unlike the Muslim League's equally false and disastrous slogan of

Islam in danger!) to garner votes, but consistently failed in their

attempts. Sikhs, by the dint of sheer hard work, prospered and came

to occupy a dominant position in many fields, including in the armed

forces. A distinction needs to be clearly made between a distinct

religious identity and political separatism based on religion.

 

Why then did Punjab erupt in the 1980s?

 

Several explanations have been offered. Some attributed it to the

deprivation of the masses in spite of the Green Revolution. Others

felt that the Akali frustration at their inability to attain

political power (as the SC/ST Sikhs and Hindus combined to support

the Congress) was at the root of the violence. Machinations by

Indira Gandhi, who was credited with having deliberately created

Sikh militancy to gather frightened Hindu votes, has also been

floated as a serious theory.

 

But none of these explanations suffices to understand the widespread

support that militancy enjoyed at its peak. To understand this

phenomenon, one has to go back to the decade of the 1960s and the

Green Revolution.

 

In 1965, when the US effectively used food aid to browbeat India,

Indira Gandhi and her dynamic minister in charge of food and

agriculture, C Subramaniam, fashioned a strategy to attain food self-

sufficiency in the shortest possible time frame. The irrigated lands

of Punjab, Haryana, and Western Uttar Pradesh were targeted for

application of miracle seeds, fertilizers and mechanisation.

 

The strategy succeeded and India became self-sufficient in

foodgrain. But rising incomes and mechanisation brought in their

wake social tensions.

 

In the hard work that intensive agricultural operations involved,

the turban and the beard were seen as a hindrance. Sikhs in large

numbers took to trimming or even shaving their beards and cutting

their hair, both against the tenets of the Khalsa (pure) Panth. The

hair and the beard are not mere external symbols for a Sikh, but a

major part of his identity.

 

Worse, many took to smoking, a taboo in the Sikh ethos. A district

like Amritsar, which has a majority Sikh population, became the

highest revenue-earning district for cigarette companies. 'Paani

piyo pump da te cigarette piyo Lamp da' was a catchy slogan that

linked the smoking of Red Lamp cigarettes with water from

the 'pump', subtly linked this symbol of the Green Revolution with

smoking.

 

In travels through Punjab as an army officer, one was always

welcomed with open arms. It was also common to share the charpoy and

lassi with the farmers. During all these encounters, one frequently

heard a lament from Sikh elders that at the rate at which people

were deserting the faith, in a few years there would be no Sikhs

left in Punjab.

 

The relationship between Sikhs and Hindus was such that the moment a

Sikh shaved his beard and cut his hair, he became a Hindu. Sikh

society felt insecure at the assault of this 'modernisation' and

feared for the survival of its identity. This feeling was not

confined to the villages but was commonplace even among the Sikh

intelligentsia.

 

In this situation of fear and foreboding arrived Jarnail Singh

Bhindranwale with his single-point programme of strict adherence to

the Sikh symbols. His campaign against trimming of hair and shaving

of beards found a groundswell of support amongst the Sikh masses.

And he enforced his dictates with ruthless force.

 

His violent methods brought him into direct confrontation with the

State and soon militancy began in Punjab.

 

But 'modernisation', the real threat, is a formless entity. So the

violence first targeted the Nirankaris, then the government

machinery, and then the Hindus. In the final stages, the terrorists

turned increasingly against the Sikhs themselves and became

predatory. It is at this stage that the militants lost support and

were finally overcome towards 1993.

 

The situation was tailormade for Pakistan. It intervened with a

generous supply of arms and ammunition and mayhem began in right

earnest. The US and the UK also saw in this an opportunity to

destabilise India, their long-term goal during the Cold War. The

West used expatriate Sikhs as an instrument of its policy and gave

shelter and support to all manner of terrorist groups.

 

Indira Gandhi saw this as a direct challenge to India's very

existence and eventually decided to act, leading to Operation

Bluestar. The rest, as they say, is history.

 

There is an uncanny resemblance in this to the Islamist terrorism

that the world is witnessing today. Like Sikhism then, Islam today

is afraid of modernisation and Westernisation. This also explains

the wide support terrorists enjoy in the Muslim world. Osama bin

Laden is a spitting image of Bhindranwale.

 

Like Sikh terrorism, the current wave of Islamist terror will

subside once the terrorists turn predatory (as their recent attacks

in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan indicate) and lose popular support.

Only then will the world be able to deal with this modern scourge.

Punjab does offer a valuable lesson.

--- End forwarded message ---