[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 125 (Wednesday, August 1, 2007)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1674-E1675]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 COUNCIL OF KHALISTAN WRITES TO CHIEF MINISTER TO DEMAND WITHDRAWAL OF 
             WARRANT AGAINST DR. UDHOKE AND RELEASE OF MANN

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, July 31, 2007

  Mr. TOWNS. Madam Speaker, as I have discussed recently, the Punjab 
Government has issued an arrest warrant against Dr. Sukhpreet Singh 
Udhoke for the crime of writing about Sikh freedom and criticizing the 
chief minister. Mr. Mann's crime was placing a picture at the statue of 
the brutal late chief minister, Beant Singh.
  The Council of Khalistan has recently written to Chief Minister 
Parkash Singh Badal to demand the withdrawal of the warrant against Dr. 
Udhoke and the release of Mr. Mann. We should join in that demand, 
Madam Speaker. We should stop aid and trade with India to support 
rights for everyone and we should demand a free and fair vote on 
freedom for Khalistan, the Sikh homeland, for Nagalim, for Kashmir, and 
for the other nations seeking their freedom.
  I would like to add that letter to the Record, Madam Speaker.

[[Page E1675]]

                                         Council of Khalistan,

                                    Washington, DC, June 28, 2007.
     Hon. Parkash Singh Badal,
     Chief Minister of Punjab,
     Chandigarh, Punjab, India.
       Dear Chief Minister Badal: I am writing to you regarding 
     the recent arrest warrant for Dr. Sukhpreet Singh Udhoke and 
     the arrests of Sardar Simranjit Singh Mann and his 
     associates. As you know, both were involved in peaceful 
     political action, which is protected under the Indian 
     constitution, at the time the warrants for their arrests were 
     issued by your government. Dr. Udhoke's offense was 
     publishing articles critical of you. Sardar Mann's was 
     protesting and placing a picture of a Sikh martyr at the 
     statue of the brutal, genocidal Beant Singh, who presided 
     over the murders of over 50,000 Sikhs. Mann had previously 
     been arrested for the dangerous crimes of making a speech and 
     raising a flag.
       You have been in opposition. You have engaged in political 
     activities while in opposition. What would you think if you 
     were arrested for those activities? That is exactly what your 
     government is doing to S.S. Mann and proposes to do to Dr. 
     Udhoke as soon as you can find him.
       When did the right to protest peacefully disappear in 
     Punjab, Khalistan? Are you determined to prove the late 
     General Narinder Singh right that ``Punjab is a police 
     state''?
       On behalf of the 25 million strong Sikh Nation in Punjab, 
     in India, and around the world, I am writing to demand the 
     withdrawal of the arrest order against Dr. Udhoke and his 
     associates and the immediate release of Simranjit Singh Mann 
     and his associates. I do not do this for political reasons; 
     Mann has been a vocal critic of this office and has 
     cooperated with the Indian government. But if you truly 
     believe in democracy--the system that put you back in power 
     earlier this year--then you cannot in good conscience arrest 
     people for dissent.
       Indeed, Mann's arrest shows what can happen to a Sikh even 
     if he cooperates with the Indian government, as you have done 
     throughout your political career to the detriment of the Sikh 
     Nation. One day, your utility to them will be exhausted and 
     they may then have you thrown in jail for a peaceful 
     political activity--simply because you are a Sikh. Who will 
     you turn to defend you then? To this office?
       Yet while you seem intent on prosecuting peaceful dissent, 
     you are unwilling to take action against those who commit 
     murder and other serious crimes. Is that because of your 
     alliance with the BJP, which is the political arm of the pro-
     Fascist, militant Hindu nationalist, anti-Sikh RSS?
       When you were elected in 1997, you promised the Sikhs of 
     Punjab that you would appoint a commission to inquire into 
     the atrocities in Punjab and prosecute the police officers 
     who murdered Sikhs. Instead, you protected SSP Swaran Singh 
     Ghotna, who murdered Akal Takht Jathedar Gurdev Singh Kaunke.
       Just recently, Gurmit Ram Rahim Singh was fraudulently 
     dressing as Guru Gobind Singh, performing baptisms that are 
     reserved for the Panj Piaras, and advertising it in the 
     newspaper. This was a desecration of the Sikh religion and a 
     fraud. Yet you met with Ram Rahim to ask for his political 
     support. But you couldn't even succeed in persuading this 
     corrupt baba to support you! Yet when he perpetrated this 
     fraud, you protected him until the political pressure to 
     prosecute him got too intense. He still has not been 
     arrested, nor has an arrest warrant been issued. I guess 
     the jails are too crowded from holding the likes of Dr. 
     Sukhbir Singh Udhoke and Simranjil Singh Mann.
       In 1978, during your Chief Ministership, the Nirankari cult 
     had a meeting and desecrated the Guru Granlh Sahib. Sant 
     Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his supporters peacefully 
     protested outside. Your police fired on the protestors, 
     killing 13 of them, then your police escorted the Nirankari 
     leader, Gurbachan Singh, safely out of Punjab.
       Apparently, you were not through trying to destroy Sant 
     Bhindranwale. According to letters reprinted in the book 
     Chakravyuh: Web of Indian Secularism, you, along with 
     Harcharan Singh Longowal and the late Gurcharan Singh Tohra, 
     invited the Indian government to attack the Golden Temple in 
     June 1984 to kill Sant Bhindranwale. 37 other Gurdwaras were 
     attacked simultaneously. Over 20,000 Sikhs were killed in 
     those attacks. Their blood is on your hands, Mr. Chief 
     Minister.
       Furthermore, your government in your previous term was the 
     most corrupt in Punjab's history. You creatively invented a 
     new term for bribery; ``fee for service.'' No fee, no 
     service. The sale of government offices was standard 
     operating procedure. Your wife even developed the handy skill 
     of being able to tell how much money was in a bag just 
     picking it up.
       Furthermore, your operatives are calling this office 
     repeatedly and harassing me about my website because it 
     exposes you. You may be able to suppress the freedom of Sikhs 
     in Punjab, but you cannot stop the Sikh diaspora from 
     exposing your brutal and corrupt acts. Remember that Sikhs 
     have a long memory of those who are traitors and murderers 
     and who cooperate with the oppressors of the Sikh Nation. 
     K.P.S. Gill's turban is still preserved in Belgium. When 
     Khalsitan is free, it will be on display so that the Sikh 
     Nation will never forget those who committed atrocities 
     against us.
       Punjab's water is being taken away by non-riparian states 
     without compensation. At least your predecessor, who is from 
     the Congress Party, the enemy of all Sikhs, tried to do 
     something about it. He cancelled the water agreements. The 
     bill passed by the Legislative Assembly expressly affirmed 
     the sovereignty of Punjab.
       Under your rule, the economy of Punjab is deteriorating. 
     Sikh farmers are committing suicide because they cannot make 
     a living, due to the fact that your friends in Delhi force 
     them to pay exorbitant prices for fertilizer and seeds, but 
     forces them to sell their crop at substandard prices. And 
     you, who as Chief Minister and head of the Akali Dal are 
     supposed to protect the interests of the Sikhs, sit there and 
     kowtow to these criminals.
       Even though the government of Pakistan said it would build 
     a road to Kartapur, where Guru Nanak went to his heavenly 
     abode, with no visas, your government has refused to build 
     the Punjab side of the road so that Sikhs can go freely to 
     this sacred site.
       From these actions, it is clear where your loyalties lie, 
     and they are not with the Sikh Nation or with the Sikh 
     religion or with the people of Punjab, but with the violent, 
     pro-Fascist, murderous Hinducrat thugs from Delhi who sponsor 
     you and your career. But remember the warning I gave you 
     earlier; when they are through with you, when you no longer 
     have any usefulness to them, they will dispense with you as 
     they have dispensed with so many other Sikhs who have served 
     them.
       That is why it is incumbent on every Sikh to engage in the 
     ``long struggle'' to free Khalistan. Only then will Sikhs 
     such as Dr. Udhoke, Sardar Mann, and even the likes of you be 
     protected from the violent and brutal whims of the oppressive 
     Hindustani regime. It is crucial to protect the Sikh religion 
     and the Sikh Nation from this oppression by liberating 
     Khalistan today, in accord with our declaration of October 7, 
     1987. For your good, Mr. Badal, I urge you to get on the 
     right side of history today. Or would you rather be 
     remembered as an enemy of the Sikh Nation?
           Sincerely,
                                              Gurmit Singh Aulakh,
     President, Council of Khalistan.

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