By Jaspal Singh Sidhu | COUNTER CURRENTS | INDIA |
The manner and intent of Indian Establishment in sending of the Indian army to the Golden Temple in Amritsar on 3 June 1984 and degradation in special constitutional status of Jammu and Kashmir on 5 August (2019) bear a lot of similarities. Both actions were sudden and unexpected carried with excessive use of the armed forces. These two events were concerted swoops intended to shock and bamboozle the targeted people of Punjab and Kashmir, thereby, rendering them numb and reactionless.
As a journalist reporting for a ‘national news agency’ from Amritsar, the epicenter of the troubled in Punjab during the 1980s, I witnessed that feverish attempts were made to create a public opinion for justifying the sending heavy forces to a religious place. For that purpose, the government hyped and propagated some flimsy grounds through docile domestic mainstream media.
Even my colleague journalists reporting for ‘national newspapers’ from Amritsar never bothered to highlight the latest history and Sikh traditions when the Akalis was the lone political party to launch a ‘morcha’ (agitation) from Golden Temple against the 1975 Emergency clamped by Indira Gandhi which was participated by BPJ leaders like L K Advani.
Now in Jammu and Kashmir the same strategy was adopted by New Delhi establishment for whipping up intended propaganda prior to the 5 August action.
Jaspal Singh Sidhu retired as Special Correspondent with United News of India, New Delhi and can be reached at jaspal.sdh@gmail.com
Read the full story, ‘Punjab of 1984 and Present Kashmir Bears Similarities’ (CounterCurrents, 16 Aug 2019), here.
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