The ultra nationalist Right Wing forces have (now) taken control of this country. It may be the BJP or the Congress. There is no difference between these two parties as far as ultra nationalism is concerned.
(In) 1984 ... at that time, though Indira Gandhi gave orders to the Indian Army to enter the Golden Temple, the BJP said that it should have been done some six months before. In 1984, the Sikh relics from the Golden Temple were taken away by the Indian Army. Since then we have had so many Prime Ministers ... but those relics have not been returned.
As far as the Sikh massacre of 1984 is concerned, the hoodlums who perpetrated this heinous crime are still at large. No party, whether it be the BJP or the Congress, has taken any action against (them). I fail to understand that if the BJP is for the Minorities, then why are these hoodlums still at large? (This) pains me. It pained me when the Babari Masjid was ... razed to the ground. The BJP (was) then ruling the State and the Central Government of P.V. Narasimha Rao did nothing about it; it simply fiddled and kept quiet. This nexus ... is very shameful.
On the passage of the Uttaranchal Bill, the Sikhs were pained because they felt that the Udham Singh Nagar should not have gone to the Uttaranchal. The BJP and the NDA supported the Bill and they proposed it. The Congress seconded its proposal.
Many Sikhs have been in jail since 1984. Article 21 of the Indian Constitution mentions that there shall be a speedy trial. But ... there has been no trial for the Sikh prisoners. Advani had promised that the Sikh detenues would be released but (his promise) has remained only on paper.
There are fake encounters against the minorities. People are caught and not brought to justice but killed. That has happened to the Sikhs. It has happened to the Muslims. You find that the state of India is not at peace with any of its minorities. Look at the peripheral State of Punjab that has become an army cantonment; look at Kashmir that is an army cantonment; and look at the North-East that is an army cantonment. This sort of thing scares us.
We are very, very unhappy and insecure. We are a religious minority and also a linguistic minority. We have our population in the border States of Rajasthan, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and in Jammu and Kashmir. But Punjabi is not taught in any of these States, and the minorities there are not getting their fair share of justice and their Constitutional rights. We now see that ultra-nationalist feelings are coming into our bureaucrats and our military officers. Most of them, when they retire, invariably want to join the BJP and the RSS-sponsored parties. We face a danger that like in Fiji we are going to be demographically upset from the influx of imported labour in Punjab. They are being given ration cards and allowed to vote. It is painful to feel that the Sikhs in their own State would become a minority in times to come.
There is the Human Rights Commission and there is the Minorities Commission but they do not have any teeth. They cannot punish any person. The Human Rights Commission cannot go into any case which is more than two years old. But the atrocities and the perpetration of genocide that has taken place against the Sikh people is of much earlier times. I would advise the Home Minister to put some teeth into the Human Rights Commission so that we can get justice.
We want to protest that ... under Article 25 of the Constitution (the Sikhs) are clubbed with the Hindus. In the Hindu Marriage Act, we are clubbed with the Hindus. We are a separate people; we have a separate language; a separate religion; a separate culture; and a separate dialect; and we want the Parliament to change the law and say that we are a separate people.
When I recently visited Canada and USA, (many) Sikhs complained that they were on the blacklist and do not get visas. This is something that perturbs me. I wish that the vengeance against the Sikhs ... ceased and they were respected and brought on at par with the majority community.
