Abdul Basit Khan
The Khalistan movement is a freedom struggle and a self-determination movement to create a separate, independent homeland for the Sikh community. Since 1947, demands for a sovereign state for the Sikh community emerged within Indian Punjab. However, this did not gain momentum amid the chaos of the newly independent India. The Sikh community does not feel safe within the current status quo and feels oppressed by its historical, cultural, and religious identity. Thus, along with the armed struggle, several referendums have revealed that most community members want an independent homeland. India has moved from a secular state to a state that is only secular in the name of minorities within its borders feeling oppressed.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the Khalistan movement re-emerged, with a head-on marginalisation of Sikhs. This friction ultimately led to the infamous Operation Blue Star, launched against the Sikh Khalistan freedom fighters. The result of this operation was devastating as hundreds of innocent worshipers, along with Mr. Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, a prominent Khalistan leader, were killed by the Indian Army. This angered not only the community but also the violation of crossing into the holiest Golden Temple, only to be slaughtered by the Indian Army, causing deep-seethed resentment. It is no wonder that the culmination of this was the assassination of the then-prime minister, Ms. Indira Gandhi. This was followed by yearlong violent riots all through 1984 by Sikhs.
The riots of 1984 became the reason for the migration of Sikh families from India to countries like Canada, the US, the UK, Australia, etc. An investigation report was drafted after Operation Blue Star, titled “Oppression in Punjab,” to understand better what was fuelling the movement. However, this report has not yet been published. The report contains several eyewitness statements of the brutality of the Indian Army against its Sikh community.
The human rights violations in the Khalistan movement have been evident ever since its inception. These violations include torture, extrajudicial killings, and disappearances by the Indian security forces. Since 1986, the Indian press has carried out reports that the police have used undercover agents with criminal records to accompany former and on-duty police officers to abduct Khalistan supporters and empathisers. In an interview, former Director General of Police J.F Ribeiro admitted that undercover agents were operating in the state and used weapons provided by the state to abduct Khalistan supporters.
Furthermore, in August 1989, a Director-General of the Punjab Police issued a notice to all police district superintendents of a financial reward for the killing of Khalistan supporters and labelled them as terrorists. The Khalistan supporters were considered creating chaos and unrest in the country. The Sikh community is one of the many vulnerable minority groups in India that is demanding a separate homeland by legitimate means.
The world changed after 9/11 with the global war on terror, which provided India with a chance to label the Khalistan movement as a terrorist movement and suppress it for the time being. The movement did not raise its head till 2012, when a young leader, AmritpalSingh, gained popularity.
To give worldwide credibility to its struggle, the Khalistan movement undertook referendums to know about the Sikh sentiments about a separate homeland for the Sikh community. The Khalistan referendum is a global undertaking and has the potential to achieve its purpose. In this connection, the first referendum was held on 31st October 2021 in the UK with the participation of 30,000 members of the Sikh community, showing their willingness to gain a sovereign state through peaceful and democratic ways of a referendum. Multiple referendums have been held since then in Geneva in 2021, Brescia in 2022, Melbourne in 2023, and twice in Vancouver in 2023. The most recent referendums were held in San Francisco (Jan 28) and California (March 31). The organisers aim to conduct referendums in South Africa and Malaysia in 2025. The aim of these referendums is to raise awareness and pressurise India to hold an official referendum
Due to the re-emergence of the Khalistan movement, India, as a strategy to curb the movement, initiated a planned series of murders of various leaders of the movement. Paramjit Singh Panwar, a Khalistan Commando Force (KCF) member, was killed in Lahore, Pakistan.These events took place after Mr Amritpal Singh was arrested. Even those remotely connected to the Khalistan movement were under attack. Khalistan empathiser Sidhu Moosewala, a prominent Indian rapper, was killed in May 2022 as he used pro-Khalistan lyrics in hissongs and visuals of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale.
In 2023, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a prominent Khalistan activist, was murdered in Vancouver, Canada. The death of Najjar caused Indian and Canadian diplomatic relations to plummet as both India and Canada expelled their top diplomats.
The same year, India orchestrated a murder attempt on Gurpatwant Singh Pannun in the US due to his organising and holding referendums for Khalistan. In response to this attempt, the US issued a warning to India.
India has a history of supporting genocide and violence to suppress its minorities. This has increased under the extremist BJP government, which heavily supports the Hindutva nationalist ideology of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). The lack of recognition of minorities in India was solidified when, during the G20 summit in 2023, Prime Minister Modi used the term “Bharat” instead of India when describing the state he was Prime Minister of, promoting Hindu nationalism internationally and eradicating the fact that the state of India was home to other ethnic and religious communities as well.
Given such persecutions, it is no surprise that India, along with the freedom struggle in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu & Kashmir (IIOJK), is also facing multiple separatist movements. All these movements have been demanding a separate homeland based on their cultural, social, and religious identity. These include but are not limited to the Manipur, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, and the Naxel-Moiset movement.
Ironically, India acts as a flag bearer of democracy but fails to accept the reality of a referendum and continually discriminates against the Sikh community. India has failed to protect its minorities, which are now speaking out due to constantly facing state-centric violence.