The butcher of Panjab! Ribeiro’s reign of terror

[s s Jhamka]

vaheguru ji ka khalsa

vaheguru ji ki fateh

dear sangat ji this artical was produced in a uk magazine called Khalistan Deeyan Goonjan which was edited by the 2 singhs that killed darshan dassi in 1987.

The butcher of Panjab!

Ribeiro’s reign of terror.

On 29 September 1985 the ‘Longowal’ Akali Ministry came into power in Panjab with Surjit Singh Barnala, a lack-lustre leader as Chief Minister and Balwant Singh a wily politician as Finance Minister. They were elected because the Sikh youth had boycotted the elections and the Sikh masses had hardly an option in their desperation for a breathing time from the unabated repression which they were being continuously subjected to. However the Barnala government failed to grapple with the manifold problems facing the state and their foremost aim was their own political survival. They ignored the trauma and turmoil the community had undergone in its struggle for justice. Both state repression and the killings of the Sikh youth continued. From the outset the Central Government of Rajiv Gandhi was ruling Panjab by proxy whereby the Akali policies were replaced by old Congress policies. There was a complete lack of faith in the administration and it soon lost its credibility to impart justice as a result of lack of action against the repression conducted by Indian Police against innocent Sikhs.

As the state was driven from one disaster to another Sikh youth became more and more restive and alienated. On 29 April 1986, a five member Panthic Committee, headed by (Shaheed) Baba Gurbachan Singh Manochachal, made the declaration for the establishment of an independent Sikh homeland - ‘Khalistan’ from the pre

cincts of Sri Darbar Sahib. As a result Barnala faced a crisis, and without taking his council of ministers into confidence, under the directive of Delhi planned and ordered a police assault, code named ‘Operation Search’ on Sri Darbar Sahib complex. This police action on Sri Darbar Sahib led to uproar amongst the Sikh masses and resulted in a number of Akali Ministers resigning from Akali Dal to form their separate Akali Dal.

However, the Barnala government was able to remain in power with the support of the Centre.

The India rulers knew they could use Barnala’s dummy government to pursue their policy of repression in Panjab, as demonstrated when Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi made J.F. Ribeiro Director General of Police in Panjab. Ribeiro was a man known for his brutality and in his appointment India desired an iron-fist policy in Panjab. Ribeiro lived up to these expectations and declared his policy of ‘bullet for bullet’ stating: “ If the terrorists are making their hit lists and hit squads, we will retaliate with our own hit lists and squads to take care of them.”

Sikh youth were on the receiving end of this policy, illegal arrests and non-judicial killings became the order of the day. The BBC summed up the situation in their report: “Indian paramilitary troops surrounded villages in the Amritsar district and conducted arbitrary house to house searches for Sikh youth. While seeking out these so called secessionists, the Indian Government has set in motion a suppressive force by which many innocent people will be endangered.” This fear was soon realised when police killed innocent Sikh youths in ‘encounters’ claiming that they had killed militants. The word encounter was used by the security forces in order to cover up deaths of innocent Sikhs caused in a variety of ways and circumstances. The Anti-Repression Co-ordination Committee (ARCO) headed by Justice Ajit Singh Bains investigated human rights violations in Panjab and believed that ninety nine percent of police encounters were bogus.

(So common are the allegations of extra-judicial killings in Panjab, that the local papers refer to such incidents as ‘fake encounters’.)

As the police fought a war against the Sikh freedom fighters, the line between what was legally right and wrong got obliterated. The police failing to catch the so-called militants directed their actions towards innocent people. Furthermore Barnala himself personally gave the names of 18 young Sikhs to be eliminated as Ribeiro remarked, “Barnala himself gave me the names of some terrorists from Gurdaspur. He said neutralise them, the situation will change. We did and things did change but only for a while.” (India Today, 31 October 1989).

Sikh armed groups fought back against this aggressive regime and proved to withstand and fight off police repression. As a result Ribeiro became increasingly aggressive and demanded further liberties to handle the Panjab situation. Having no need of the Barnala government, the Centre dismissed it on 12th May 1987 and imposed Governor Rule – headed by Governor S.S. Ray (afterwards posted as High Commissioner for USA).

“I feel confident we will get results. More officers will join battle. Those who don’t will be replaced . It would have been quicker if President’s rule had come earlier” said Ribeiro. As the Panjab came under the direct control of Ray-Ribeiro combined, both the judicial system and constitutional laws were eliminated. Ribeiro justified this on the ground that he could not have persons whom he considered to be culprits to be convicted by the courts because witnesses to prove their guilt were not available. Ribeiro set upon a reign of terror and adapted entirely illegal, indefensible and terrorist tactics which included employing criminals who indulged in all kinds of crimes - like murder, robbery, looting, rape, etc.. This was deliberately done to create public opinion against the Sikh armed groups in order to brand them as the perpetrators of crimes. Furthermore, it was intended that in the rural areas, individua

ls and families apart from becoming sympathetic to the cause of the Sikh freedom fighters, became hostile to them, thereby creating at the village level factional divisions, leading to further crime.

The Panjab Human Rights Organisation (PHRO) revealed that 73 Sikh youths were killed in fake encounters between May 12th and August 22nd, 1987. Ribeiro declared that in Panjab ‘police accountability is to itself’. One of the illegal tactics used by Ribeiro was the floating of a ‘vigilante group’ known as ‘Alam Sena’. The SSP of Amritsar, Mohammed Khan Alam had sold Ribeiro the idea that the authorities needed to occasionally by-pass the legal system if they were to get instant results in their fight against terrorism. When reports first appeared in the Indian press about this vigilante group, Alam had denied the existence of such a force. The Indian Government also initially continued to deny the existence of this sinister organisation. A correspondent of India Today Vipul Mudgal, gave a lead story on these undercover organisations, and said that the Government was “recruiting the policemen with criminal tendencies for a special task force to be constituted along the lines of the Dirty Dozen…. police backed vigilantes consisted of a band of dismissed policemen and elements expelled from the Sikh guerrilla groups. There squads were let loose, no questions asked fully armed with guns and ammunition, bombs to match those of the freedom fighters. They started to loot, plunder and kill innocent people and all this was blamed on Sikh groups in order to discredit the independence movement.

One of these vigilantes was Dalbir Singh who had been dismissed from the police but was re-employed to commit numerous crimes including bank robberies, docoities, murders etc.. He became a favourite of Ribeiro, when he helped the police in nabbing some Sikh freedom fighters. He shot into prominence when he gunned down one of the leading Sikh freedom fighters of the KCF, Lt.General Shaheed Bhai Surinder Singh alias K.C. Sharm

a, and Bhai Harvinder Singh ‘Bunty’ of the SSF at a bus station in Chandigarh. When hotly pursued by the Chandigarh police, who mistook him for a militant, Dalbir Singh slipped into Rebeiro’s house and sought shelter with him. For his services Dalbir Singh had been given two out of turn promotions, a jeep, a Maruti car, a Fiat and two armed guards. He was posted in Patiala with no official daily routine; his secret jurisdiction extended to the whole of Panjab and even nearby states. By his criminal activities he amassed wealth and properties in Patiala, Chandigarh and Mohali. These activities firstly came to light when he was summoned by the area SP and was presumably being asked either to declare or share his exploits when he picked up a revolver lying on the table and shot the SP, Baldev S Brar. The senior SP Sital Das came running from the next door office, Dalbir Singh shot him too and then shot himself. “I would kill myself rather than letting the police find out everything about me.” he had reportedly told an associate.

Another notorious member of the vigilante outfit was Santokh S Kala who mainly operated in the Jullandhar area. Kala was approached by the police to work as a hired gun. He was supplied with arms, money, ammunition and at least one car. Later his group were stripped of their weapons and placed under arrest by the CRPF. Numerous robberies and other crimes had been committed by Kala with the Sikh guerrillas being blamed for these activities.

Ribeiro had no hesitation in justifying the creation of the vigilante squads as he told India Today: “ Police all over the world take the help of undercover people. There is no doubt about the fact that we had also been using people like Dalbir ... But the unfortunate killing of two of our officers, this would not have come out in the press at all ”. When Ribeiro was asked about the legality of such measures, he replied, “Don’t governments use spy networks for collecting information ? Is that legal ? In fighting this undeclared war in Panjab

what matters is success in tracking down ‘killers’.”

It is clear that Ribeiro considered himself to be above the law, in fact he believed in the existence of no law, no government and no human rights. The only option for the Sikh armed groups was to meet him at his own level. General Labh Singh led a unit of the Khalistan Commando Force (KCF) and made an attack on the police Head Quarters in Jullandhar. However Ribeiro managed to save his skin by diving to the floor and playing dead. After this incident Ribeiro knew that his life was in danger from the Sikh freedom fighters and he left India and was posted in Romania as High Commissioner.

But the situation for the Sikhs did not change in Panjab as soon as one butcher left he was replaced with another in the form of K.P. Gill.

Despite persistent allegations of extra-judicial killings by the security forces there have been relatively few inquiries into alleged ‘fake encounters’ in the Panjab. Furthermore, restrictions have been adopted by the Indian Government limiting access of world wide human rights groups, such as Amnesty International, to the state of Panjab and this has resulted in these incidents of genocide remaining uninvestigated. In the absence of official enquiries and investigations by international human rights organisations, the only source of detailed scripting into the allegations of ‘false encounters’ have been the work of locally based civil liberty and human rights groups. However, due to government restrictions, the lack of co-operation by the security forces and fear amongst civilian witnesses from appraisals by the security forces, such investigations by locally-based groups are rare.

There is no justice in India for the Sikhs and today the situation is even more bleak with thousands of Sikh youth fleeing India knowing that the security forces are tracking them down. The only option left for Sikhs is an independent homeland Khalistan and the success of the Sikh movement depends largely on the success of our f

reedom fighters. We must commit ourselves to supporting our youth who against heavy odds, carry on risking their lives and those of their loved ones to further the cause of human freedom from oppression, tyranny, bigotry, slavery and exploitation.

Long Live Khalistan.

Bhai Jugbir Singh

Sikh Students Federation (S.S.F.)