Issue 44 Vol II, July 31, 2007

H I S T O R Y

Akalis and Khalistan-4

IN the north west of India from the 16th century onwards Sikhism has played a central role in shaping society’s religious, social and cultural ethos. It has impacted politics too. Noted historian Professor J.S. Grewal whose research and writings have shaped generations of scholars traces some of the aspects of Sikhism and its influence in a five part article.

The idea of Khalistan was advertised in the New York Times in October 1971 by Jagjit Singh Chauhan.  He had enjoyed a short spell of power as a minister in the Cabinet of Lachhman Singh Gill for nine months in 1967-8. Living in England now, Chauhan had no following in the Punjab. His idea of Khalistan was treated as a joke but it could embarrass the Akalis. Whenever he visited India he was treated well by some eminent leaders of the Congress. About a decade later, in June 1980, Balbir Singh Sandhu announced the formation of Khalistan, claiming himself to be the Secretary of the National Council of Khalistan with Jagjit Singh Chauhan as its President. This organization existed only on paper. In March 1981, a US citizen Ganga  Singh Dhillon, who was known to Chauhan, addressed the annual session of the Sikh Educational Conference organized by the Chief Khalsa Diwan, and put forth the view that the Sikhs formed a ‘nation’. The implication was that an independent state could be demanded on that basis. Soon afterwards, however, the Chief Khalsa Diwan dissociated itself from Dhillon’s statement.

Besides the National Council of Khalistan, the White Paper on the Punjab published by the Government of India mentions another significant group the Dal Khalsa, which operated from overseas.  It had been formed at Chandigarh in April 1978.  Its President was a stenographer of the Panjab University who had published a pamphlet on Khalistan. The term ‘Dal Khalsa’ served as a reminder of the ‘national army’ of the Sikhs which had succeeded in establishing sovereign Sikh rule during the late eighteenth century. In 1979 it contested elections for the SGPC, but without any success. In 1982 the responsibility for throwing the head of a cow in a Hindu temple was reported to have been claimed by the Dal Khalsa. The founding of the Dal Khalsa is attributed to Giani Zail Singh who paid the bill for its first meeting at the Aroma Hotel at Chandigarh and who used to ask journalists to give prominence to its activities.

The Khalistan movement has been associated with Sant Jarnail Singh more than with anyone else. What has been published on his life and of his speeches enables us to notice some of the relevant aspects of his activities and attitudes.  He was initially a protagonist of religious reform. At the age of thirty, he assumed the headship of Damdami Taksal on the death of Sant Kartar Singh Bhindranwale in 1977. He also inherited the legacy of an open conflict with the Sant Nirankaris who were looked upon as heretical by Sant Kartar Singh. The armed clash on the Baisakhi day of 1978 at Amritsar was an extension of this legacy, underlining the religious dimension of Sant Jarnail Singh’s outlook and attitude. He continued to declare till June 1984 that religion was his sole concern. For him, the Adi Granth was the only sacred scripture of the Sikhs; Guruship was vested in this Granth, giving it the status of Guru Granth Sahib. The Khalsa code of conduct provided the only valid mode of life for the Sikhs. He believed in fact that the antidote to external and internal threats to Sikhism was strict conformity to the Khalsa way of life. Insistence on the maintenance of the external form and hostility to drugs and alcohol appear to flow from his religious outlook. That this concern distinguished him in his own eyes from the other Sikh leaders comes out clearly in a statement he made in 1984 that he was responsible only to the cause of Sikhism, to uphold the symbols of the faith, to see that the beards of the Sikhs remained intact and their hair uncut, and that they did not go after the evil things in life, like alcohol and drugs.

However, there was another dimension of his religious outlook. To bear arms was a religious duty of the Sikhs. The choice of arms was not confined to the sword (kirpan) as one of the obligatory five Ks. It was extended to modern weapons, which also carried the implication that they were meant to be used. For him, use of physical force was a legitimate part of religion. If anything, his insistence on the use of arms went on increasing. Quite explicitly he told his audience from the roof of Guru Ram Das Langar when he was virtually confined to the Golden Temple complex:

For every village you should keep one motorcycle, three baptized Sikhs and three revolvers. These are not meant for killing innocent people. For a Sikh to have arms and kill an innocent person is a serious sin. But, Khalsaji, to have arms and not to get your legitimate rights is even a bigger sin. It is for you to decide how to use these arms. If you want to remove the shackles of your slavery you must have a plan.

In other words, you had to be up in arms against the enemies of the faith. In his mind, hostility towards the government easily got transferred to ‘Hindus’: ‘If you do not have the five “ks”, if you are not armed with a rifle and a spear, you will be given the beating of your lives by the Hindus.’ The reference here is to the killing of Sikhs but even otherwise Sant Jarnail Singh could bracket ‘Hindus’ with the government. ‘I only finish those,’ he said on another occasion, ‘who are enemies of the Sikh faith like police men, government officials and Hindus’.

The language used by Sant Jarnail Singh has been generally interpreted to support the view that he was leading an armed struggle for Khalistan. Naturally, his movement is looked upon as ‘secessionist’. The White Paper issued by the Government of India refers to secessionist and anti-national activities which had the objective of establishing an independent state for the Sikhs with external support. The activities of Sant Jarnail Singh are included in this view of the situation. However, when he was asked by a journalist in 1983 whether or not he supported the demand for Khalistan, his reply was: ‘I am neither in favour of it nor against it. If they give it to us, we won’t reject it’. He repeated this in March 1984. In one of his morning ‘darbars’ on the roof of the Langar he asked the audience if they wanted Anandpur Sahib Resolution implemented in full.  Hands were raised by the congregation and Sant Jarnail Singh was satisfied: ‘You need not say anything more’. He warned the Akali leaders that if they accepted anything less than all the demands in the Anandpur Sahib Resolution he would expose them before the Sikhs. Thus, whereas his activities and his informal responses to questions on Sikh independence may seem to point towards Khalistan, his formal stand did not go beyond autonomy for the Punjab as a part of the Indian Union.  Possibly, he came to support the idea of Khalistan after the army action but before his death.

Articulation in favour of Khalistan became pronounced after the death of Sant Jarnail Singh. For this development, it is possible to see the relevance of the Operation Blue Star and the Sikh massacres in Delhi in the wake of Indira Gandhi’s assassination. Even more important was the failure of Rajiv-Longowal Accord. In any case the number of militant groups and the number of youngmen who joined them during seven years after the death of Sant Jarnail Singh appears to have been far larger than their number during the seven years of his own activity from 1977 to 1984. Many of the Sikhs living in Great Britain, Canada and the United States were vocal in favour of Khalistan. Many of the militants working in the Punjab made no secret of their political objective. Continuity was provided by two important organizations: the All India Sikh Students Federation (which had been closely associated with Sant Jarnail Singh under the leadership of Bhai Amrik Singh, the eldest son of Sant Kartar Singh), and the Damdami Taksal. On their initiative, a meeting of the Sarbat Khalsa (in theory, the entire body of the Sikhs) was held at the Golden Temple on 26 January 1986. A flag of Khalistan was hoisted and the Akal Takht rebuilt by the government was demolished to be reconstructed.  Khalistan was proclaimed a few months later. In August 1987, at a convention called by the Acting Jathedar of the Akal Takht, Professor Darshan Singh, it was declared that the goal of the Sikh Panth was to have a political set-up in an area in which the Sikhs could experience a glow of freedom (presumably within the Indian State). This did not satisfy the militants. They continued their activity for at least five years more.

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