India's Unatoned Sin: 1984

insaaf singh · June 22, 2004

1984: India’s Unatoned Sin

B.S. Mahal*

At a premier of “Schindler’s List", at Frankfurt, Germany, Director-Producer Steven Spielberg cautioned that we cannot make good the present and the future “until we make peace with our past”. If let to fester the historic hurts and humiliation of a people can become a burden of history.

Euphoric over his electoral victory in Delhi, Chief Minister Madan Lal Khurana vowed to punish the perpetrators of the 1984 anti-Sikh carnage. No matter how good his intentions, he has a fat chance of collaring the guilty! His is a government within a government, jocularly labelled as “C-grade", meaning “all frills and no power”. Real power rests with the Center. And the Center remains monopolised by the Congress(I), wherein are sheltered some of the known thugs. Loyalties have, therefore, spun apart into their constituent tribal lines. Thus, atonement for the sins of November 1984 is stuck in platitudes.

The bestiality of 1984 continues to haunt the Sikh collectivety. The images of the savagery are as fresh today as were a decade ago. They are a picture “rewind", and played a thousand times in the mind’s eye. A picture so gruesome and bloodcurdling as to be “D” rated, “D” as in demonolatry. A viewer may randomly select one excerpt or another to make a telling point; but, whichever the excerpt, it is a mere variation on the theme of Cain’s vengeance.

Picture this excerpt. In the thick of night, armed with staves, axes, and steel pipes, some carrying kerosene cans, some carrying fiery torches, and fueled by alcohol, a raging mob swarms through the narrow streets of Trilokpuri, one of Delhi’s bedroom communiti

es. At the head of the crowd run amuck, is a well known politician. He is a ranking member of the ruling Congress(I). His one hand clutches a list which the villain intends to use to finger Sikh homes, target of their furore. As the rogue politician points to a portal, a small squad splits up from the mob to storm the marked house, the rest of the swarm moves forward onto the damned portal and then the next, till all Sikh homes are brought to account.

From each Sikh household, in a bizarre division of tasks, the howling band drags the male members out into the dark dingy lane, ransack the house for loot and gang-rape the women folk. Outside in the dimly lit lane, the elder Sikh male is beaten and wrestled to the ground, his turban partially undone. Someone places an old tyre around his neck, another fills it with kerosene and sets it on fire. The torched man screams and tries to free himself from the scorching necklace but the mob hit him on his arms, hands and legs with staves to keep him in yoke. Soon the flames engulf the man and helplessly he crumbles to the ground, writhing in pain, his screams fading into an eerie moan as life ebbs away. Soon the manly man lies as a heap of ash.

The man’s adolescent son is made to watch the staged immolation of his father. Suddenly, a youngman, glassy eyed, in a karate-like move, lunges forward to plunge a piece of iron-pipe through the boy’s torso. Blood cascades out of the gaping hole in the chest. Simultaneously, another provocator, swirls around like a mad dervish and torches the house. Flames leap into the sky. The heart-wounding crying and wailing fill the hamlet. Pungent smell of burning flesh assails the nostrils.

As the howls of the mob fades into the distance, they leave in their wake death and destruction. The butchery goes on, day after day, from one city-site to another township. Cries of “teach the Sikhs a lesson” reverberate everywhere. Soon most of the major cities of northern India were a saturnalia of blood. Neither the police nor t

he political leadership even made the slightest pretense to shield the sufferers of the pogrom. It was as if the authorities wanted to let the thugs have their way. Some policemen even acted as forerunners sweeping clean Sikh homes of all weaponry to make them an easy prey.

Thus unfolded November 1984. This slaughter of the innocents was the price exacted for the slaying of Mrs Gandhi by her Sikh guards. As the world watched the mayhem, the “spin doctors” were busy concocting alibis to blot out the sins of the government. That the anti-Sikh rioting reflected “spontaneous” outpouring of rage, triggered by the assassination, was the oft-repeated excuse. Reality defied that poor excuse. For example, the rioting erupted in an instant following the announcement of the assassination; overnight bus-loads of instigators were trucked in and unloaded at strategic Sikh settlements; countless of the rioters carried, by design, paraphernalia such as staves, iron pipes, kerosene cans and old tyres; and the savagery went on for days unabated and unchecked.

All sorts of enquiries were launched, ostensibly to ferret out those responsible for the carnage. Despite the naming of political bigwigs, by victims, bystanders and news-video, no one has been brought to book. Closed door hearings with limited terms of reference, an unsympathetic police and an absence of impartial jurists, added up to make a mockery of the proceedings. The findings were a fait accompli, only the process had to be made to run its course. The law enforcement agencies fared no better. Their top officials were engaged in an exercise of self-sanitization. The rank and file circled the wagons to protect their own.

However, the police could not just sit idly by. They, too, had to give the appearance of searching for the facts. Their half-hearted attempts to collar one or two echelon figures failed, or backfired. Thus, the make-believe court of enquiry and the foot-dragging by the police incensed the Sikhs. As the farce went on, many Sikh boy

s lost heart. A few hot-heads took the law into their own hands and gunned down Lalit Maken, a prominent trade unionist, who was seen as an accomplice in crime. This was the defining moment. From now on, guilty or not, an impenetrable security blanket was thrown over all those implicated in the 1984 riots.

In an ironic turn of events, those who ought to be under legal scrutiny are instead shielded by police protection. The mere acceptance of police protection is seen by some as an admission of guilt. But, to the accused the very fact that they are protected by police attests to their innocence. The accused continue to live a privileged life. For example, Sajjan Kumar, Jagdish Tytler, H.K.L. Bhagat and D.D. Shastri hold, or have held, cabinet level posts at the Center. The only noteworthy police action involved the attempt to arrest Sajjan Kumar. But, on coming to know in advance the imminent arrest of their patron, his supporters ringed his house to form a protective cover to keep the police at bay. That was the end of that police action.

Matters were no different in the political arena. For example, fearing a Sikh backlash in the 1991 national elections, if he were to be the candidate from the Karol Bagh riding of Delhi, Dharam Das Shastri, another alleged culprit, was asked by Congress(I) party bosses to withdraw his nomination. In an interview to “The Statesman", a recalcitrant Shastri hinted that if forced to resign he will name names of those responsible, going so far as to say that his testimony can “push” Rajiv Gandhi into “the mud” and “to banish him for 14 years”. No one has followed up on the covert accusation. Perhaps because to do so will rock the boat. That the circle of complicity extends far beyond the foot soldiers is in no doubt. Which explains why the veil of secrecy continues to be drawn over Nov. ’84 rioting. The most striking and appalling feature of the communal clashes was the Hindu on Sikh violence, a first of its kind.

But, the events of Nov ’84 are no Chinese

puzzle. A closer look at the anatomy of the carnage reveals three distinct phases: planning, execution and connodation. Skeptics will question the planning aspect, making it appear as far-fetched. But, to plan is to foresee. Only a fool will not have foreseen the coming assassination of Mrs Gandhi. Sikh history is replete with instances of reprisals upon those who have defiled their temples or hurt their spirit. Take for example the slaying of Sri Michael O’dwyer, in 1940, in London, by a Sikh, Udham Singh. Sir Michael was held responsible as Lt-Governor of Punjab, for the 1919 massacre of Sikhs at Jallianwala Bagh. By ordering the attack on the Golden Temple, in June 1984, Mrs Gandhi had similarly sealed her fate. The only question was when, and where, the deed will be done. Plans were, therefore, drawn up to be activated the instant Mrs Gandhi were to be killed.

The plans were elaborately drawn. The intent was to wreak the maximum havoc, as borne out by the ferocity and the depth of the ’84 carnage. But, no riot will succeed in the face of stringent law enforcement. Keeping law and order in India, however, depends on communal equation. That is to say who is rioting against whom. For example, within hours of the March 1993 Bombay bombings which were directed at Hindus, Prime Minister Narasimha Rao declared a state of emergency, as was only right, whereas in January he sat by quietly watching the Shiv Sena go on a killing spree against a minority.

That the Nov 1984 anti-Sikh riots spread out so far and wide, and were allowed to go on for days, bears witness to a tacit approval from the authorities. It is interesting to note that the current Prime Minister Narasimha Rao served, in November 1984, as Rajiv Gandhi’s Home Minister, with responsibility for domestic security. It is no wonder that a cloud of suspicion hangs over the inner circle of the Congress(I). The Congress(I)) the party ruling India today as it did then in 1984, is equally determined to put the lid on the intrigue. Party veterans w

ill admit to no wrongdoing. For them appearances are everything. For instance, Congress(I) took a dim view of the Jan 1994 decision by Buta Singh, a party nob, to do a 56-day penance in historic gurdwaras, at the behest of the Akal Takht Sahib. Buta Singh was judged to have sinned by the Sikh clergy in going against their dictum to rebuild the Akal Takht, Sikhism’s highest temporal seat, which has been turned into a ruin by the June ’84 Indian Army action. Thus there is no end to the on-going conspiracy of silence.

Only a wide-spread clamour will unravel the conspiracy. Until now only a handful of well-intentioned activists are hammering away at the wall of silence. They realise the importance for an inter-ethnic bargain, that is, punish the guilty to win over the alienated Sikhs. What is disturbing is that the Sikhs themselves appear in a disarray. Though the Sikhs make up a substantial portion of Delhi’s population, and given the fact that the most of the victims were Delhite Sikhs, it is dismaying to note that they have not mounted a single mass protest or demonstration.

It is not that the Sikhs are amateurs when it comes to protests. For instance, recently an estimated 10,000 Sikhs marched to the US Embassy, in New Delhi, to protest US President Clinton’s remark over “a peaceful solution (in Punjab) that protected Sikh rights”. In sharp contrast, another contingent of Sikh activists staged their own pro-Clinton rally. Even Beant Singh, Punjab’s Chief Minister, in a speech at Jalandhar castigated President Clinton for speaking out on India’s record of human rights in Punjab. Not to be outflanked on the matter of patriotism, Maninderjit Singh Bitta, President of Indian Youth Congress, staged his own demonstration at Wagah, near Amritsar, to condemn Pakistan for its human rights violations in “Indian Kashmir”.

In absolute terms, no single act of cold-bloodedness can overtop the inhumanity of November 1984. Human rights violations in Punjab, Kashmir, Assam, Bihar and elsewhere have been v

oluminously documented by Amnesty International and Asia Watch. It is no surprise that human rights remain India’s Achilles heel. At the June 1993 World Conference on Human Rights, at Vienna, India came prepared to fight it out with her critics. India’s chief delegate at the conference was none other than a Sikh, Manmohan Singh. He is a brilliant economist, but no authority on civil rights. But then who else is better suited to white-wash allegations on human rights violations in Punjab than a Sikh, and a government Minister to boot. Similarly, fully aware that violations of civil and human rights in Kashmir will be at the heart of the March ’94 conference of U.N. Human Rights Commission, at Geneva, India chose a Muslim, Salman Khursheed, another government Minister, to mount the counteroffensive against her censors.

So blatant a play of the communal card ought to exacerbate ethnic resentments. Instead such manipulations go uncensured for fear that any questioning of the motives of the government will be tantamount to disloyalty, especially considering that phrases like “anti-India” are increasingly becoming part of the argot of the nation. Consequently, any attempts to redress communal grievances are passed over. And, by keeping mum over the 1984 carnage, the Sikhs appear to have assumed the posture of the proverbial “monkeys who did not see-hear-speak-any-evil.” The code of silence lets the criminals escape without penalty. The more the crimes remain unvoiced or unacknowledged by the Sikhs, lesser the chances for the guilty to be brought to justice. Such taciturnity is a boon to the Congress cabal. They know that time is on their side and that, with each passing year, the memory of ’84 fades a little further into the distance. By not putting a face to death and debasement, the slaying of thousands of Sikhs and the wanton raping of their women, will be reduced to mere cold statistics. These innocent Sikh victims must not be made to have died unjustly, unrequited and unremembered.

Feigning of amne

sia by influential Sikhs, and stonewalling by Congress bosses is an unholy alliance. By this piquant machination of circumstances Sikhs have become an accessory to the conspiracy. Which is well and good for the authorities who would rather let sleeping dogs lie. After all law and order, in India, is a child of ethno-political undercurrents. For example, Sikh or Muslim terrorists or criminals are relentlessly pursued, apprehended, often tortured, tried, convicted and hanged. The majority community, on the other hand, has yet to pay the price for a similar communal killing. One is, therefore, tempted to ask what good is law if the minorities lack the right of enforcing it.

Such discrimination is a cause of great discomfort for the minorities, who are made to believe that their well-being depends on the goodwill of the ‘host’ community. The rights of a minority will, therefore, not prevail when these collide with the interests of the majority. Thus, it appears less likely for Nov ’84 carnage to be solved to the satisfaction of the Sikhs. Despite such a flagrant disregard of their feelings, Sikhs continue to nurse the conspiracy of silence, reminding one of Fydor Dostoevesky’s lament: “is not possible to eat me without insisting that I sing the praises of my devourer?”.