[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 103 (Thursday, July 25, 2002)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1391]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           SIKHS OBSERVE ANNIVERSARY OF GOLDEN TEMPLE ATTACK

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, July 25, 2002

  Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to note 
a historic occasion that is being observed this week. In addition to 
our observance of D-Day, the day that Allied troops landed in Europe to 
begin the attack on Nazi Germany, this week marks the anniversary of 
India's military attack on the Golden Temple in Amritsar and the brutal 
massacre of 20,000 Sikhs in June 1984. Recently, Sikhs from the East 
Coast gathered to commemorate this event in front of the Indian Embassy 
here in Washington. Similar events have been held or will be held in 
New York, London, and many other cities.
  The Golden Temple attack was an attack on the seat of the Sikh 
religion. It forever put the lie to India's claim that it is secular 
and democratic. How can a democratic state launch a military attack on 
religious pilgrims gathered at the most sacred site of their religion? 
The Indian troops shot bullet holes through the Sikh holy scriptures, 
the Guru Granth Sahib, and took boys as young as eight years old out in 
the courtyard and shot them in cold blood. This set off a wave of 
repression against Sikhs that continues to this day.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to put the flyer from that event into the 
Record now. It contains a lot of important information about the Golden 
Temple attack that shows the tyranny just under the facade of Indian 
democracy.

 Indian Government Genocide Against the Sikh Nation Continues to This 
                                  Day

       From June 3 to 6, 1984 the Indian Government launched a 
     military attack on the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the holiest 
     of Sikh shrines and seat of the Sikh religion. This is the 
     equivalent of attacking the Vatican or Mecca. 38 other 
     Gurdwaras throughout Punjab Khalistan were simultaneously 
     attacked. More than 20,000 Sikhs were killed in these 
     attacks.
       Desecration of the temple included shooting bullets into 
     the Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh holy scripture, and 
     destroying original Hukam Namas written by hand by the ten 
     Sikh Gurus. Young Sikh boys ages 8 to 12 were taken outside 
     and asked if they supported Khalistan, the independent Sikh 
     homeland. When they responded ``Bole So Nihal,'' a religious 
     statement, they were shot to death in cold blood by the 
     brutal Indian troops.
       The Golden Temple attack launched an ongoing campaign of 
     genocide against Sikhs by the Indian government that 
     continues to this day. Punjab, Khalistan, the Sikh homeland, 
     has been turned into a killing field.
       The Golden Temple attack made it clear that there is no 
     place for Sikhs in India.
       The Movement Against State Repression issued a report 
     showing that India is holding at least 52,268 Sikh political 
     prisoners, by their own admission, in illegal detention 
     without charge or trial. Some of them have been held since 
     1984. Many prisoners continue to be held under the 
     repressive, so-called ``Terrorist and Disruptive Activities 
     Act (TADA),'' even though it expired in 1995. According to 
     the report, in many cases, the police would file TADA cases 
     against the same individual in different states ``to make it 
     impossible for them to muster evidence in their favor.'' It 
     was also common practice for police to re-arrest TADA 
     prisoners who had been released, often without filing new 
     charges.
       ``In November 1994,'' the report states, ``42 employees of 
     the Pilibhit district jail and PAC were found guilty of 
     clubbing to death 6 Sikh prisoners and seriously wounding 22 
     others. They were TADA prisoners. Uttar Pradesh later 
     admitted the presence of around 5000 Sikh TADA prisoners.'' 
     Over 50,000 Sikhs have been made to disappear since 1984.
       Sikhs in Punjab, Khalistan formally declared independence 
     on October 7, 1987, to be achieved through the Sikh tradition 
     of Shantmai Morcha, or peaceful resistance. Sikhs ruled 
     Punjab from 1765 to 1849 and were to receive sovereignty at 
     the time that the British quit India.
       While India seeks hegemony in South Asia, the atrocities 
     continue.
       India has openly tested nuclear weapons and deployed them 
     in Punjab, weapons that can be used in case of nuclear war 
     with Pakistan. These warheads put the lives of Sikhs at risk 
     for Hindu Nationalist hegemony over South Asia. The Indian 
     government is run by the BJP, the militant Hindu nationalist 
     party in India, and is unfriendly to the United States. In 
     May 1999, the Indian Express reported that Indian Defense 
     Minister George Fernandes led a meeting with representatives 
     from Cuba, Russia, China, Libya, Iraq, and other countries to 
     build a security alliance ``to stop the U.S.''
       In March 42 Members of the U.S. Congress from both parties 
     wrote to President Bush asking him to help free tens of 
     thousands of political prisoners.
       India voted with Cuba, China, and other repressive states 
     to kill a U.S. resolution against human-rights violations in 
     China.
       India is a terrorist state. According to published reports 
     in India, the government planned the massacre in Gujarat 
     (which killed over 5,000 people) in advance and they ordered 
     the police to stand by and not to interfere to stop the 
     massacre. Last year, a group of Indian soldiers was caught 
     red-handed trying to set fire to a Gurdwara and some Sikh 
     homes in a village in Kashmir.
       According to the Hitavada newspaper, India paid the late 
     Governor of Punjab, Surendra Nath, $1.5 billion to organize 
     and support covert state terrorism in Punjab and Kashmir.


                  CONTINUING REPRESSION AGAINST SIKHS

       Since 1984, India has engaged in a campaign of ethnic 
     cleansing and murdered tens of thousands of Sikhs and 
     secretly cremated them. The Indian Supreme Court described 
     this campaign as ``worse than a genocide.''
       The book Soft Target, written by two Canadian journalists, 
     proves that India blew up its own airliner in 1985 to blame 
     the Sikhs and justify more genocide. The Indian government 
     paid over 41,000 cash bounties to police officers for killing 
     Sikhs, according to the U.S. State Department.
       Indian police tortured and murdered the religious leader of 
     the Sikhs, Gurdev Singh Kaunke, Jathedar of the Akal Takht. 
     No one has been punished for this atrocity and the Punjab 
     government refused to release its own commission's report on 
     the Kaunke murder.
       Human-rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra was kidnapped by 
     the police on September 6, 1995, and murdered in police 
     custody. His body was not given to his family. Rajiv Singh 
     Randhawa, the only eyewitness to the police kidnapping of 
     Jaswant Singh Khalra, was arrested in front of the Golden 
     Temple in Amritsar, Sikhism's holiest shrine, while 
     delivering a petition to the British Home Minister asking 
     Britain to intervene for human rights in Punjab.
       In March 2000, 35 Sikhs were massacred in Chithisinghpora 
     in Kashmir by the Indian government.
       Since Christmas 1998, India has carried out a campaign of 
     repression against Christians in which churches have been 
     burned, priests have been murdered, nuns have been raped, and 
     schools and prayer halls have been attacked. On January 17, 
     2001, Christian leaders in India thanked Sikhs for saving 
     them from Indian government persecution. Members of the 
     Bajrang Dal, part of the pro-Fascist Rashtriya Swayamsewak 
     Sangh (RSS), the parent organization of the ruling BJP, 
     burned missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons, ages 
     8 and 10, to death while they slept in their jeep. The RSS 
     published a booklet last year on how to implicate Christians 
     and other minorities in false criminal cases.

     

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