DefinePK

Abstract

The month of June reminds us of the incursion by the Indian law-enforcing agencies in the Golden Temple of Amritsar in 1984 and killing of the Sikh freedom-fighters who had taken cover there along with their leader, Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale. The Sikhs who were present inside the Golden Temple were spearheading the Sikh separatist movement, known as the movement for „Khalistan,‟ which refers to their Sikh-majority independent homeland. The movement for establishing such an independent Sikh state was then raging with full fury in the Indian Punjab. The Indira Gandhi Government in New Delhi had already labeled these Sikh freedom-fighters as „terrorists‟ and using that pretext had attacked the Golden Temple, claiming that it was being used by the Sikhs as a hideout for their „anti-state‟ activities. Indira Gandhi had intended to deal a mortal blow to the hitherto uncontrollable Sikh uprising which had outgrown its original borders of Indian Punjab and whose serious political and diplomatic ramifications were being felt internationally, specifically, in the countries where the Sikhs had emigrated from India, especially in UK and the US