The Background

The roots of the present problem go back to before the Independence of India. At that time the British envisaged the formation of three separate countries : one dominated by Hindus, one by Moslems and one by Sikhs. The Sikhs on the basis of solemn assurances given to them by Mahatma Gandhi, Nehru and other Congress leaders, regarding their constitutional and religious freedoms, put their trust in the Hindu majority and opted to remain as part of India. With the benefit of hindsight, it is clear that the trust was misplaced. Ever since Independence, for them, it has been a long and fruitless struggle to win those rights which had been assured to them as long ago as 1929.

"The brave Sikhs of Punjab are entitled to special consideration. I see nothing wrong in an area and a set up in the North wherein the Sikhs can also experience the glow of freedom."[1]

These are the words of Jawahrlal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India, three years prior to Independence. They symbolise the goodwill and understanding promised to the Sikhs by the Congress. More formal assurances were also given to the Sikhs regarding their future in India, over the 30 years leading up to Independence.

But before we continue, it is important to note that the Sikh position was different from the rest of India. Until the mid-nineteenth century, the Sikhs had a large sovereign kingdom of their own, stretching from just north of Delhi to the Afghanistan border. After the death of the ruler, Maharaja Ranjit Singh (1780-1839), infighting amongst the Sikhs and clever manoeuvring on the part of the British resulted in the absorption of Punjab into the British Empire. However, the British exercised control over the Punjab through treaties made directly with the (former) Sikh Raj and not as part of India. Therefore, any negotiations for the end of British rule in the subcontinent would, naturally, have involved the discussion of Punjab as a separate entity. Or, more precisely, that would have been the case up to about 1930. From the late twenties onwards, the Congress party started to woo the Sikhs and persuaded them to join the Union of India. Congress was greatly helped in this by the feeling amongst the Sikhs that they were all brothers looked in a common struggle for independence.

The first assurance was given in 1929, following a huge independence rally held by Sikhs in Lahore; in the words of the Times, the 500,000 strong procession led by the veteran Sikh leader Baba Kharak Singh, "put the Congress show into shame and shadow". Mahatma Gandhi, Nehru and other Congress leaders then met Baba Kharak Singh and gave the Sikhs their solemn assurance that:

"After India has achieved political freedom, no constitution will be framed by the majority unless it is freely acceptable to the Sikhs."[2]

Two years later, in 1931, Mahatma Gandhi reiterated this assurance at Gurdwara Sisgang in Delhi, adding:

"I ask you to accept my word and the resolution of the Congress that it will not betray a single individual much less a community. If it ever thinks of doing so, it will not only hasten its own doom but that of the country too."[3]

Congress also passed several resolutions concerning the political make up of post- independence India: It committed itself to a union of states, to be based on linguistic and cultural boundaries and, which were to be loosely governed by a federal government[4]. Only months before Independence, Nehru declared:

"The various territories of the Union of India will be autonomous units with residuary powers."[5]

But ultimately, it was the human value of trust rather than formal resolutions which persuaded the Sikhs to remain as part of India. After ail, using Nehru's words, the commitment to uphold the rights of the minorities was:

"a declaration, a pledge and an undertaking before the world, a contract with millions of Indians, and therefore, in the nature of an oath, which must be kept."[6]

Such was the faith of the Sikhs in the sincerity or the congress assurances that the Sikh leadership stated:

"Sikhs have no demands to make. They will satisfy their political rights and aspirations through the goodwill of the congress and the majority community." [7]

However, the 'goodwill' seems to have evaporated rapidly with the coming of Independence. One of the most immediate and vivid examples was a secret circular sent out to all Deputy Commissioners in Punjab by the Home Minister V.B.Patel. In essence, they were instructions that Sikhs, particularly those migrating from Pakistan, should be treated like a "criminal tribe"; they were urged to be severe so that the Sikhs should wake up to the political realities and recognise "who are the masters and who the slaves"[8].

In 1950, when the Indian constitution was drafted, Sikhs (along with Buddhists and Jains) were categorised as Hindus. The Sikhs were deeply offended by this and saw it as a refusal by Congress to recognise the independence of their religion. Therefore, considering the constitution unacceptable, and having felt betrayed, the Sikh representatives walked out in protest and refused to ratify the constitution. However, Sikh protests had virtually no effect and gradually all the personal laws of the Sikhs were abolished and Hindu laws were enforced upon them. For example, the 'Anand Marriage Act' was replaced by the 'Hindu Marriage Act', of 1955[9]. All this despite the solemn promise that no constitution would be imposed on them!

After Independence, Congress also started to drag its feet on the reorganisation of state boundaries on linguistic and cultural grounds. However, by the mid-fifties the Government had conceded to the formation of linguistically based states in the South of the country - Andhra, Karnatka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu. At the same time, agitations were also going on demanding a Punjabi- speaking state, but these were to no avail. Without going into the detailed history of the agitations, commissions and political manoeuvring [10], it suffices to note that the end result was the formation of Haryana, an extended Himacheal Pardesh and the present Punjab by 1966. This was not the solution the Sikhs had been looking for. Sikhs had already suffered greatly as a result of the partitioning of Punjab between India and Pakistan in 1947[11]. And now, the already shrunken Punjab was further being lopped in half to form a Hindi-speaking state (Haryana), which nobody had asked for. Furthermore, the small remnant Punjab was still denied the status of a Punjabi-speaking area and was declared a bilingual state Of course a language census was taken but this was a total farce: so much anti-Punjabi (hence, implicitly anti-Sikh) hysteria had been whipped up by extreme Hindu groups like the Jan Sang (more will be said about these later) that virtually all Punjabi- speaking Hindus denied Punjabi as their language and claimed 'allegiance' to Hindi. The sad fact is that most of these Punjabi-speaking Hindus had to deny that their mother-tongue was Punjabi in Punjabi itself, since their knowledge of Hindi was non-existent!

To go back to the situation in the 1950's, when Nehru was reminded of the assurances he had given to the Sikhs before Independence and all the broken promises since, his reply was simply "the circumstances have now changed". Indeed, the times had changed: Congress was no longer seeking power but was in power and the Sikhs were increasingly given the feeling of being 'undesirable' elements of Indian society rather than an integral part of it.

Post-independence events suggest that Congress was not prepared to accept the Sikhs for what they were - a distinct religious and cultural community forming one of the nations in the Union of India - but rather, they were regarded as breakaway Hindus to be brought back into the folds of Hinduism. Ian Stephens, an historian and journalist who spent much of his life in India, comments:

"The British, after 1857, may in a general. way be said to have buttressed Sikhism up, for Imperial purposes of their own. And since the subcontinent's partition in 1947, political pressures from Delhi for the Sikhs' reabsorption into Hinduism have inevitably become stronger."[12]

Since Independence, Sikhs have felt that their religion has been constantly under attack through political and economic discrimination against Punjab (their homeland) and through conspired interference in their religious affairs. For. example, the failure to form a Punjabi-speaking state is seen as an attempt to undermine Sikhism by destroying its cultural roots, since the Sikh Scriptures are written in Punjabi. This suspicion is not unfounded as most of the Punjabi-speaking Hindus were persuaded to deny Punjabi as their language (by Hindu fundamentalists) on the grounds that 'Punjabi implied Sikhism'. What is more, punjabi has been banned form schools in the neighbouring states like Haryana - a former part of Punjab with a large (traditionally) Punjabi- speaking population. Instead, languages like Tamil, from South India, which have no cultural links with the North are being introduced as the second languages in schools.[13]

Economically too, Punjab, a largely farming state, has been made to suffer. Farmers in Punjab have to pay higher prices for their agricultural inputs but are offered lower prices for their produce in comparison with neighbouring states; the central government has assumed sole control over prices and farmers are not allowed to cross state boundaries to get higher prices for their labours in the next state. Again, electricity generated by the hydro-electric dam Bhakra on the Punjab border is more costly in Punjab than it is in neighbouring states. Very little has been invested in the Punjab by the government, particularly in industrial terms. The government, of course, claims that Punjab is already a rich state and so the wealth and investment must be channelled into poorer states. This is perfectly reasonable now but one has to realise that in 19~7 Punjab was a state utterly broken and totally ruined both economically and socially by the Partition with Pakistan; it has only become successful by the hard work and initiative of its inhabitants and with virtually no help from Delhi Now that Punjab is a fairly rich state, and industrial development is no longer a question of finance from l0elhi, the central government still frustrates any attempt to develop Punjab. The state government is powerless to undertake any major regional development programme without the permission of Delhi --- the states are hardly "autonomous units" as Nehru had promised.

Even more serious than the general and widespread discrimination against the Sikhs in India is the malicious interference in their religious affairs. One form in which this appears is the strong support given to breakaway groups from Sikhism. The formation of new sects is inevitable, of course, and this occurs in every religion and society. However, the situation becomes very suspect when the government gives large grants and land to new 'movements' whilst, at the same time, causing as much hindrance as possible to the spread of ail main-stream religions except Hinduism. There are several such groups which are Sikh-like in appearance but fundamentally opposed to it [l4l and which have grown out of all proportions purely as a result of government funding. The motivation for such action can only be to cause divisions amongst the Sikhs and thereby undermine their religion.

Perhaps we should conclude this section by one last example of how the Sikhs have been made to feel more and more alienated from India since Independence. The issue is the restrictions on the recruitment and promotion of Sikhs in the armed forces; this especially-offends the Sikhs for, at least since the inception of the Khalsa, they have considered themselves a martial race. Even now, the Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi claims that there is no discrimination considering that the Sikhs are represented by numbers greater than their proportion in the country. For the Sikhs, however, it is not a matter of numbers and percentages. For example, before independence Sikhs formed 60% of the volunteer Indian Liberation Army led by Subhas Bose even though they only formed just over I of the population. The same is true for the other sacrifices made in the struggle for the Independence of India and also since Independence. The Sikhs feel that they have been loyal to the country and served her in her hour of need, out of ail proportion to their numbers; by now insisting that Sikhs should only represent 2% of the forces they are deeply insulted, and feel that they are perceived as some sort of threat to the country. For the Sikhs it has never been a matter of 2% or 20% but, rather, a question of being treated with equality as Indian citizens, and judged on their merits and not dismissed as a small minority.