Tinderbox state

 

 

A July 30 e-mail addressed by Babbar Khalsa to journalists in Patiala set the cat among the pigeons. The militant outfit claimed responsibility for the murderous attack on Rashtriya Sikh Sangat leader Rulda Singh, who succumbed to his injuries a few days later. This was not an isolated incident.

A day earlier, Lily Kumar, a follower of the Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda, had been gunned down in Patiala. This Dera, headed by the controversial Baba Ram Rahim Singh, has followers in parts of Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. It has the power to influence political permutations and combinations in the region in general and the Malwa area of Punjab in particular. The Dera has been at loggerheads with Sikh religious organisations for some time.

The Rashtriya Sikh Sangat is an affiliate of the Sangh Parivar. When the Akali Dal-BJP combine came to power in Punjab in 1997, the Sangat had tried to spread its tentacles in the border state. The activities of the Sikh Sangat and its parent body, RSS, provoked hardliners in the state. The Akal Takht, the supreme Sikh institution for prayer and politics, had to take a stand against the RSS much to the discomfiture of moderate Akalis. Rulda Singh, who had his religious training in Damdami Taksal, considered to be the fountain head of militancy in the 1980s, shot into prominence when he came into contact with some militant leaders settled overseas, particularly in Europe.

This interaction was part of an RSS initiative to put an end to the legacy of the dark days of Punjab militancy. The Sikh Sangat considers Sikhs to be part of the greater Hindu family. In a recorded interaction with some leaders, Rulda Singh had claimed that he was close to BJP leader L.K. Advani.

Senior police officials who have been in the forefront of the fight against militancy are keeping their fingers crossed. Preferring anonymity, one officer says, “These two incidents cannot be dismissed as isolated. The situation calls for a close watch.” And there are striking similarities between the current situation in Punjab and that which prevailed in 1978.

However, this perception is not shared by Dr Pramod Kumar, Director, Institute for Development and Communications and Chairman of the Administrative Reforms Committee constituted by the Punjab government. “These are only sporadic incidents but they need to be taken seriously. There is no chance of resurgence of any extreme political articulation,” he says. There is, he argues, no external stimulus to aid and abet a renewed spurt in militancy in Punjab.

The flare-up in the late 1970s stemmed from simmering tensions between Sikhs and Nirankaris. The first militant killing was of Nirankari chief Baba Gurbachan Singh in 1980 to avenge the killing of 13 Sikhs in Amritsar by Nirankaris on Baisakhi day of 1978. The second leader to be targetted was also a Nirankari. The sect had come under attack allegedly for denigrating the Sikh theology.

Today, it is the Dera Sacha Sauda that has earned the ire of Sikh organisations. The head of the sect had appeared at a congregation in a dress associated with Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth Sikh Guru. As it had done in the case of the Nirankaris, the Akal Takht issued a hukamnama (edict) against the Dera. The similarities do not end here. Parkash Singh Badal was the Chief Minister in 1978. Of course, his government had been dismissed by the time Baba Gurbachan Singh was gunned down in 1980. However, he had come under fire from leaders like the then Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee chief, Gurcharan Singh Tohra, for pussyfooting on the Nirankari issue. This was one of the allegations levelled against him in the chargesheet submitted by Tohra and the then Akali Dal President, Jagdev Singh Talwandi, to Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Sadhu Singh Bhaura while resigning from their posts in 1979.

Badal is Chief Minister again and he is once more under severe attack from the radicals for his soft approach towards Dera Sacha Sauda. One prominent Sikh religious leader spearheading the campaign against the Dera is Takht Damdama Sahib chief, Jathedar Balwant Singh Nandgarh, an appointee of the SGPC. The tone and tenor of his speech at a recent meeting in Bathinda district, which discussed the situation arising out of arrests made by the police following the attack on Dera Sacha Sauda followers, cannot be dismissed.

He said, “It is our bad luck that the Sikh-oriented ruling party has now adopted anti-Sikh policies just to secure Dera votes… If the state government does not control the police and stops shielding Dera followers who are anti-Sikh, peace in the state will collapse soon.”

The attack on Badal has come from within the Sikh religious establishment. The radicals allege that the Badal family entered into a deal with Dera Sacha Sauda to ensure the victory of Harsimrat Kaur Badal, wife of deputy chief minister and Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal, from Bathinda. However, she won by a margin of over 1.25 lakh votes, which cannot be attributed to this alleged tacit understanding. It was more the mismanaged Congress campaign that helped her win comfortably. However, Dera activists are now being allowed to hold their congregations in the state, which is being cited as evidence of a tacit understanding. These congregations had stopped following the Akal Takht hukamnama.

“Badal is again following an appeasement policy and the situation is getting communalised. Let there be CBI inquiry into the present situation relating to these incidents at this very stage rather than indulging in a blame game later,” says Dr. Joginder Dayal, member of the national executive of the Communist Party of India who had waged a relentless campaign against militancy. He said the silence of the BJP on the killing of its leader Rulda Singh could be understood as the party was part of the government in the state in alliance with the Akali Dal. He pointed out that portraits of slain militant leaders were on display at a recent function organised by the Akali Dal (Panj Pardhani) recently at Issru village near Khanna to pay tributes to Karnail Singh Issru, the first martyr in the struggle to liberate Goa. This, says Dr. Dayal, was an indication that radical organisations are active again in the border state. During the last two years, portraits of Shaheed Bhagat Singh and Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale are witnessing a spurt in sales. Bhindranwale may be missing, but the socio-political indicators are exactly the way they were in the 1970s. Unemployment has assumed alarming proportions and successive governments have done little to rejuvenate the economy, which collapsed during the long years of President’s rule in the aftermath in militancy.

“Badal has not learnt his lessons. He could have taken corrective measures when his party came to power in 1997. But his politics hasn’t changed,” says Dal Khalsa spokesman Kanwarpal Singh, a once-radical outfit which has now adopted democratic means to attain its goal.

The Badal government has sought a special package from the Centre to deal with left wing extremism. The Naxalite outfits are steadily extending their support base in certain pockets of the state but the methods for the struggle have been democratic and peaceful. The Maoists are concentrating mainly on deprived Dalits. However, Punjab is today a tinderbox that, in a case of history repeating itself, could explode if the administration does not shed its complacency. A fragmented society

When the ripples triggered by the attack on leaders of Dera Sachkhand Ballan in far off Vienna reached Jalandhar, it became clear how simple it is to shatter the uneasy calm that prevails in today’s Punjab.

Punjabi society is highly fragmented. This Dera is venerated by the Ravidasias at the global level. The second in command of the Dera Sant Ramanad succumbed to his injuries. The Dera head, Sant Naranjan Das, had also been injured. This attack was attributed to Sikh hardliners though exact details of the incident are still not available.

The objection of the Sikh organisations was that though the Dera believes in Guru Granth Sahib, it does not mainstain its prescribed maryada. The followers of the sect also touch the feet of the Dera head in the presence of Guru Granth Sahib which is not permitted in the Sikh religion.

A section of the Ravidasias is Sikh. The situation during the couple of chaotic days when a part of the state was put under curfew was also an indication of the strong undercurrents of tension in the society.

Sikh religion is casteless, but Sikh society isn’t. Gurdwaras based on castes have mushroomed not only in Punjab but also overseas, where Punjabis have settled over the years. This goes against Sikh philosophy. The Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee has miserably failed to check this trend. The irony is that this Parliament of the Sikhs has a president who, for the first time in its history, is referred to by his sub-caste Makkar. The SGPC had no doubt issued an appeal when Avtar Singh Makkar took over not to refer to him as Makkar. However, at a news conference at Chandigarh, he said he was known by that surname. Not that the Dera culture is a recent phenomenon. The Deras have existed ever since the founding of the Sikh religion and some of the Deras have also made positive contributions to the Sikh religion. However, the deras have ruffled feathers within Sikh organisations with acts and utterances that are variance with the tenets of Sikhism. Trouble has been brewing in Punjab for quite a while now. The time for action is now.