Inssan abhee tak zindaa hae,
Zindaa hone per sharminda hae!
Human beings are still alive;
They are ashamed to be alive!
It would be no different in present day India ruled by
RSS-BJP.]
For almost last 3 decades, on every anniversary of the
horrific 1984 massacre of Sikhs in India, this author has been reminding the
Nation how Indian State and judiciary did not bother to punish the perpetrators
of this horrendous mass killing of the innocents of the second largest
religious minority of our country. On every anniversary the author hoped that
now justice would be done and he would not have to write the painful story once
again as a reminder. It has not happened in year 2022 also; the saga of the
criminal betrayal by the Indian Republic has no end and author like the victims
continues to cry before a deaf and dumb Indian State. Shockingly, on the 40th anniversary
of the genocide of Sikhs, the Indian State even stopped to claim that it was
working for getting justice to the victims, like in the past!
What is the status on the eve of 40Th anniversary of
getting justice for 2,700 Sikhs massacred in Delhi [official figure, according
to the civil rights organizations around 3,000 were killed] was made
clear by renowned advocate H S Phoolka, who has been fighting cases on
behalf of the victims selflessly in Delhi in the following words:
“The number of commissions and committees set up to probe
the murders… is more than the number of convictions…One such commission was the
G T Nanavati Commission, set up in 2005 by the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led NDA
government. According to its report, 587 FIRs were registered in Delhi in
relation to the riots. While 241 of these have been filed as untraced, 253
ended in acquittal. Of the remaining, 40 FIRs are pending trial and one is
pending investigation. Eleven FIRs have been quashed, and in 11 other FIRs, the
accused have been discharged. Three cases have been withdrawn. To date, just 27
cases have ended in convictions. Of these, just 12 are convictions in murder
cases.”
‘Anti-Sikh riots: Four decades on, just 12 murder
cases have ended in conviction’, The Indian Express, Delhi, October 31, 2024.
TWO KINDS OF JUSTICE
Whenever the country witnesses large-scale violence against
the minorities and Dalits, the search for perpetrators continues endlessly and
the criminals are rarely identified or punished. Major incidents of violence
against minorities like Nellie massacre (1983), Sikh massacre (1984),
Hashimpura custodial massacre of Muslim youth (1987), pre/post- Ayodhya mosque
demolition violence against Muslims (1990-92), Gujarat carnage (2002) and
Kandhmal cleansing of Christians (2008) and continuing blood-bath of Kuki
Tribals (who are mostly Christians) in Manipur are testimony to this
reality.
But when the victims are Dalits or minorities no such
urgency is shown. In such cases Indian State is fond of playing
commission-commission. Enquiry Commissions after commissions would be
constituted to see that the heinous crimes disappear from the public memory.
The horrendous massacre of Sikhs in different parts of India in 1984 is a
living testimony of this criminal attitude of the Indian justice system with
the motto in Sanskrit: ‘Yato Dharma Tato Jaya’ [Where there is
righteousness and dharma, there is victory]. Judiciary must explain what it
means by Dharma. Does it include religions of minorities and right of Dalits
also?
The scenario of the anti-Dalit violence is no different. The
major incidents of persecution and massacre of Dalits; 1968 Kilvenmani
massacre, 1997 Melavalavu massacre, 2013 Marakkanam anti-Dalit violence, 2012
Dharmapuri anti- Dalit violence (all in Tamil Nadu), 1985 Karamchedu massacre,
1991 Tsundur massacre (all in AP), 1996 Bathani Tola Massacre, 1997 Laxmanpur
Bathe massacre (all in Bihar), 1997 Ramabai killings, Mumbai, 2006 Khairlanji
massacre, 2014 Javkheda Hatyakand, (all in Maharashtra), 2000 Caste persecution
in (Karnataka), 5 Dalits beaten/burnt to death for skinning a dead cow 2006,
2011 killings of Dalits in Mirchpur (all in Haryana), 2015
anti-Dalit violence in Dangawas (Rajasthan) are some of the
thousands of incidents of the Dalit persecution. In almost all these cases
perpetrators are yet to be identified. Even if identified the prosecution rate
never exceeded 20%.
On the other hand, the Dalit, working class and minority
‘perpetrators’ of violence are efficiently put on trial by constituting special
investigation teams and punished by fast track courts. In order to meet the end
of ‘justice’, ‘national security’ and ‘wish of the society’ they are hanged and
jailed. The over-all reality is that whenever victims are minorities, working
class and Dalits the State and judiciary go into coma.
BETRAYAL BY GOVERNMENTS TILL 2014
After giving free run to the killer gangs, the government
appointed one man Marwah Commission to find out the perpetrators of the 1984
‘riots’. As this exercise was proving inconvenient, it was asked to disband
itself within short period of its existence and a sitting Supreme Court Judge
Ranga Nath Mishra was asked to conduct inquiry into 1984 ‘riots’ who submitted
his report in 1987. Shockingly, this fact finding (or fact-hiding) commission
headed by Misra observed that
“riots which had a spontaneous origin later attained a
channelized method at the hands of gangsters”.
The massacre was reduced to ‘riots’ as if Sikhs equally
participated in the violence. It was a brazen lie. The ‘apostle of justice’,
Mishra, champion of the theory of spontaneity was not, naturally, able to find
out from where these gangsters came! According to Jarnail Singh author of the
book I Accuse: The Anti-Sikh Violence of 1984 for this service
to the State he was awarded a berth in Rajya Sabha.
Next two decades, not less than nine commissions of inquiry
were instituted. For Indian State it became a routine to announce constitution
of some new commission or some more compensation to the families of victims in
order to deflect the mounting anger at the times of elections. Highlighting the
anti-minority bias of such commissions, H. S. Phoolka, a renowned lawyer,
commented that instead of getting convicted many of the political perpetrators
get promoted as rulers.
In the latest development Supreme Court of India on August
16, 2017 ordered the constitution of a panel comprising two of its former
judges to examine the justification for closing 241 anti-Sikh riot cases probed
by SIT in next 3 months;these three months are yet to be over!
BETRAYAL BY THE PRESENT RSS/BJP RULERS
RSS claims to have always stood for Hindu-Sikh unity. It
occasionally expresses its gratitude to Sikhism for saving Hinduism from the
Muslim aggression. It may not be irrelevant to note here that RSS does not
treat Sikhism as independent religion, which discarded Casteism and Brahmanical
hegemony, but part of Hinduism. The RSS/BJP leaders blamed Congress for
anti-Sikh violence Modi while addressing a public rally during last
parliamentary elections at Jhansi, UP (October 25, 2013) asked Congress leaders
to explain who “killed thousands of Sikhs in 1984” and “has anyone been
convicted for the Sikh genocide so far”. Modi during Punjab elections and 2014
general elections kept on referring to ‘qatl-e-aam’ or genocide of Sikhs.
Modi after becoming PM in a message (October 31, 2014) said
that anti-Sikh riots in the aftermath of Indira Gandhi’s assassination were
like a,
“dagger that pierced through India’s chest…Our own people
were murdered, the attack was not on a particular community but on the entire
nation.”
Hindutva icon, RSS whole-timer and PM Modi lamented the fact
that culprits were yet to be booked and tried for this massacre. However, Modi
did not tell the nation what NDA governments which ruled this country from 1998
to
2004 did to persecute the culprits. Modi also forgot to
share the fact that as per the autobiography of LK Advani (page 430); it was
his Party which forced Indira Gandhi to go for army action infamously named
as Operation Blue Star which killed large number of Sikh
pilgrims.
Renowned journalist Manoj Mitta, author of the book When
a Tree Shook Delhi: The 1984 Carnage and Its Aftermath straight
forwardly tells that
“Despite the BJP rule, there has hardly
been any will to enforce accountability for the massacres that took place under
the Congress. It’s as if there is a tacit deal between the sponsors of 1984 and
2002″.
It was no over-sight that during 2024 parliamentary
elections 1984 massacre was totally forgotten. This is not what outsiders or
critics of the RSS have been telling. The perusal of the contemporary RSS
documents show that major focus was on condemning the Sikh extremism,
eulogizing Indira Gandhi and welcoming the crowning of Rajiv Gandhi as new
prime minister.
RSS IDEOLOGUE NANA DESHMUKH’S DEHUMANIZED ATTITUDE
TOWARDS SIKH MASSACRE
The most important proof of such a dehumanized attitude
towards the massacre of Sikhs is a document circulated by Nana Deshmukh,
a prominent whole timer and ideologue of the RSS [now deceased]. This document
titled as ‘MOMENTS OF SOUL SEARCHING’ was circulated by
Deshmukh on November 8, 1984, may help in unmasking the whole lot of criminals
involved in the massacre of innocent Sikhs who had nothing to do with
the killing of Indira Gandhi. This document may also throw
light on where the cadres came from, who meticulously organized the killing of
Sikhs. Nana Deshmukh in this document is seen outlining the justification of
the massacre of the Sikh community in 1984.
This document also shows the true degenerated and fascist
attitude of the RSS towards all the minorities of India. The RSS has been
arguing that they are against Muslims and Christians because they are the
followers of foreign religions. Here we find them justifying the butchering of
Sikhs who according to their own categorization happened to be the followers of
an indigenous religion. In this document we will hear from the horse’s mouth
that the RSS like the then Congress leadership believed that the massacre of
the innocent Sikhs was unavoidable.
This document was published in the Hindi Weekly Pratipaksh edited
by George Fernandes, who later became Defence Minister of
India in the NDA regime, in its edition of November 25, 1984 titled ‘Indira
Congress- RSS collusion’ with the following editorial comment:
“The author of the following document is known as an
ideologue and policy formulator of the RSS. After the killing of Prime Minister
(Indira Gandhi) he distributed this document among prominent politicians. It
has a historical significance that is why we have decided to publish it,
violating the policy of our Weekly. This document highlights the new affinities
developing between the Indira Congress and the RSS. We produce here the Hindi
translation of the document.”
The original pages of the Hindi Weekly Pratipaksh edited
by George Fernandes, reproduced below.
Deshmukh in his document ‘MOMENTS
OF SOUL SEARCHING’ is seen outlining the
justification of the massacre of the Sikh community in 1984. His defence of the
carnage can be summed up as in the following:
- The
massacre of Sikhs was not the handiwork of any group or anti-social
elements but the result of a genuine feeling of anger.
- Deshmukh
did not distinguish the action of the two security personnel of Indira
Gandhi, who happened to be Sikhs, from that of the whole Sikh community.
According to his document the killers of Indira Gandhi were working under
some kind of mandate of their community.
- Sikhs
themselves invited these attacks, thus advancing the Congress theory of
justifying the massacre of the Sikhs.
- He
glorified the Operation Blue Star and described any
opposition to it as anti- national. When Sikhs were being killed in
thousands he was warning the country of Sikh extremism, thus offering
ideological defense of those killings.
- Sikh
community as a whole was responsible for violence in Punjab.
- Sikhs
should have done nothing in self-defence but showed patience and tolerance
against the killer mobs.
- These
were Sikh intellectuals and not killer mobs which were responsible for the
massacre. They had turned Sikhs into a militant community, cutting them
off from their Hindu roots, thus inviting attacks from the nationalist
Indians. Moreover, he treated all Sikhs as part of the same gang and
described attacks on them as a reaction of the nationalist Hindus.
- He
described Indira Gandhi as the only leader who could keep the country
united and assassination of such a great leader such killings could not be
avoided.
- Rajiv
Gandhi who succeeded Mrs. Gandhi as the PM and justified the nation- wide
killings of Sikhs by saying, “When a huge tree falls there are always
tremors felt”, was lauded and blessed by Nana Deshmukh at the end of the
document.
- Shockingly,
the massacre of Sikhs was being equated with the attacks on the RSS cadres
after the killing of Gandhiji and we find Deshmukh advising Sikhs to
suffer silently. Everybody knows that the killing of Gandhiji was inspired
by the RSS and the Hindutva Ideology whereas the common innocent Sikhs had
nothing to do with the murder of Indira Gandhi.
- There
was not a single sentence in the Deshmukh document demanding, from the
then Congress Government at the Centre or the then home minister Narsimha
Rao (a Congress leader dear to the RSS who later silently watched
demolition of Babri masjid by Hindutva goons as PM of India in 1992)
remedial measures for controlling the violence against the minority
community. Mind it, that Deshmukh circulated this document on November 8,
1984, and from October 31 to this date Sikhs were left alone to face the
killing gangs. In fact November 5-10 was the period when the maximum
killings of Sikhs took place. Deshmukh was just not bothered about all
this.
- It is
generally believed that the Congress cadres were behind this genocide.
This may be true but there were other forces too which actively
participated in this massacre and whose role has never been investigated.
It could be one of the reasons that actual perpetrators remain unknown.
Those who witnessed the genocide were stunned by the swiftness and
military precision of the killer/marauding gangs (later on witnessed
during the Babri mosque demolition, burning alive of Dr. Graham Steins
with his two sons, 2002 pogrom of the Muslims in Gujarat and cleansing of
Christians in parts of Orissa) which went on a burning spree of the
innocent Sikhs. This, surely, was beyond the capacity of the thugs led by
many Congress leaders.
- It is
shocking that Deshmukh presented 1984 massacre of Sikhs as an issue
between Sikhs and Hindus. He wrote: “I feel proud of all those Hindu
neighbours who protected lives and property of troubled Sikh brothers
without caring for their lives. Such things one being heard from all over
Delhi. These things have practically increased the faith in natural
goodness of human behavior and particularly faith in Hindu nature.” He
remained oblivious to the fact that these were not only Hindus but
Muslims, Jains, Buddhists, Christians, Atheists, Communists who defended
Sikhs’ lives and properties.
RSS’ SHAMEFUL ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE SIKH MASSACRE
Deshmukh document did not happen in isolation. It
represented the real RSS attitude towards Sikh genocide of 1984. It may be
relevant to know here that the RSS cadres did not come forward in defence of
the Sikhs. The RSS is very fond of circulating publicity material, especially
photographs of its khaki shorts-clad cadres doing social work. For the 1984
violence they have none. In fact, Deshmukh’s article also made no mention of
the RSS cadres going to the rescue of Sikhs under siege. This shows the real intentions
of the RSS during the genocide.
The RSS English organ, Organizer in its
combined issue dated November 11 & 18, 1984 carried an editorial titled
‘Stunning Loss’ which praised Indira Gandhi in the following words:
“It will always be difficult to believe that the Indira
Gandhi is no more. One had got so used to hearing her myriad voices for so
long, that everything looks so blank without her. The violent manner of her
death is the most shocking horror story, giving the nation the creeps…It is a
case of treacherous fanatics stigmatizing the whole nation by butchering a
remarkable specimen of Indian womanhood…She literally served India to the last
drop of her blood according to her own lights.” The same editorial ended with
the words supporting newly installed PM, Rajiv Gandhi who “deserves sympathy
and consideration”.
Organizer also carried statement of RSS Supremo;
Bala Deoras titled ‘Balasaheb condemns assassination, Delhi carnage’ in a
single column. He mourned and condemned the carnage but not even once referred
to the fact that Sikhs were under attack. For him it was “infighting in the
Hindu Samaj”. He also overlooked the fact that it was not only Delhi where
Sikhs were butchered/burnt but in many other parts of India too. According to
this statement “swayamsevaks have been instructed to form or help in forming
Mohalla Suraksha Samitis” for restoring peace and rehabilitation of the
sufferers. However, there are no documents available in the contemporary RSS
archives to show how these Samitis functioned. It is a fact that RSS which is
fond of displaying photographs of its cadres doing social work did not publish
any visual of the activity of these Samitis.
In the same statement Deoras reacting to the assassination
of Indira Gandhi stated,
“It is shocking beyond words to express
the feelings at the murder of PM Mrs. Indira Gandhi by
some fanatic elements. She had been carrying on almost the entire burden of the
country since 1966. She was loved and respected not only in this country but
all over the world. Her passing away at this critical juncture will create a
void in India and also in the world.”
According to the above mentioned Organizer,
“RSS Sarkyavah, Rajender Singh issued instructions to all
the branches in the country to hold a special meeting in Shakha
condemning the dastardly murder of the PM and paying homage to the
departed soul. He also issued instructions to cancel all public functions
to be held by RSS during the period of mourning”.
Of course, RSS archives do not contain any instructions from
RSS top brass ordering to mourn the Sikh victims.
RSS AGAINST FORMER PM MANMOHAN SINGH’S APPOLOGY FOR
1984 MASSACRE
The RSS continues to downplay 1984 Sikh massacre will be
clear by the perusal of charter of demands submitted to the National Council of
Educational Research and Training (NCERT) in last July. The senior RSS
ideologue, Dina Nath Batra on behalf of RSS-affiliated Shiksha Sanskriti Utthan
Nyas submitted five pages containing list of items to be removed from school
text- books. Batra demanded that any reference to violence against minorities
in the text-books should be removed which included references to a simple
apology tendered by the former PM Manmohan Singh over 1984 violence. It is to
be noted that in an apology in Parliament on August 12, 2005, Manmohan Singh,
the then PM of India stated:
“I have no hesitation in apologizing to the Sikh
community. I apologize not only to the Sikh community, but to the whole Indian
nation because what took place in 1984 is the negation of the concept of
nationhood enshrined in our Constitution.”
So the search for finding the perpetrators of Sikh massacre
of 1984 continues endlessly. The present RSS/BJP rulers who claim to be
co-religionists of Sikhs prove no different from Congress. The only hope is
that those Indians who have stakes in continuation of democratic-secular Indian
polity will come forward to force the Indian State to identify and punish the
killers. The scholars who have been involved in the study of religious violence
are unanimous in the conclusion that if 1984 massacre was not allowed to
happen, there would not have been 1992- 93 (violence against Muslims in
pre/post Babri mosque demolition period), 2002 (massacre of Muslims in
Gujarat), Kandhmal 2008 (cleansing of Christians) and many other massacre of
the minorities of India. Allowing the 1984 massacre the Indian State, let it be
known to all the majoritarian fascist organizations that in such criminal
happening the former would remain silent!
Name:
Email:
NANA DESHMUKH AWARDED ‘BHARAT RATNA’
As if it was not enough injustice to the martyrs and
survivors of the 1984 massacre, on the eve of the last Republic Day (January
25, 2019) RSS/BJP rulers of India, bestowed the highest national award BHARAT
RATN (gem of India) on Nanaji Deshmukh. PM Modi praising Deshmukh said,
“He [Nana Deshmukh] personifies humility, compassion, and
service to the downtrodden. He is a Bharat Ratna in the truest sense”.
If anybody wants to understand the exact meaning of the
proverb ‘to rub salt into the wound’ this Bharat Ratna to Deshmukh is the
fittest example!
This photograph is of a street theatre performance titled
‘Sadharan Log (common people) by Nishant Natya Manch against massacre of Sikhs
in 1984. It was performed at more than two thousand places. The author is also
doing a role.
Link of a 2023 interview of the author on the same tragedy:
Shamsul Islam is a retired professor of Delhi
University
Link for some of S. Islam’s writings in English, Hindi,
Urdu, Marathi, Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali, Punjabi, Gujarati and video
interviews/debates:
Link for some of S. Islam’s writings in English, Hindi,
Urdu, Marathi, Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali, Punjabi, Gujarati and video
interviews/debates:
http://du-in.academia.edu/ShamsulIslam Facebook:
https://facebook.com/shamsul.islam.332 Twitter: @shamsforjustice http://shamsforpeace.blogspot.com/
Email: notoinjustice@gmail.com
Link for the full English text of the RSS ideologue Nana
Deshmukh’s document: https://www.academia.edu/4890979/RSS_IDEOLOGUE_ NANA_DESHMUKH_J USTIFIED_MASSACRE_OF_SIKHS_IN_1984_From_RSS_archives_
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