HVK Archives: Akalis turning Sikhs into pygmies: Gill
Akalis turning Sikhs into pygmies: Gill - The Hindustan Times
HT Correspondent
()
10 August 1997
Title: Akalis turning Sikhs into pygmies: Gill
Author: HT Correspondent
Publication: The Hindustan Times
Date: August 10, 1997
Former Punjab Director General of Police K. P. S. Gill in his much-awaited
book 'Punjab The Knights of Falsehood', has accused the Akali leadership of
"pygmyfying the once proud Sikh community."
Talking to newsmen here last evening, Mr Gill said that the recent spate of
terrorist activities in the State had provoked him to write the book. "I
felt that something was needed to be said immediately," he said.
The former police chief said that the recent bomb blasts and the
possibilities of resurgence of terrorism "is due to the fact that basic
issues - the structures and patterns of politics - that gave rise to
militancy in Punjab have not been addressed during these intervening years
of peace."
In his book he states: "Worse still, I see no evidence of any attempt being
made to address these issues, as a variety of myths are not only propounded
to explain away terrorism as well as the hard won victory over terrorist in
Punjab. But to make martyrs of the perpetrators of terror."
In an obvious reference to the present Akali leadership the former DGP
said: "The most vigorous advocates of this new mythology are the very
leaders who stood at the centre of the political structure and pattern of
petty conspiracies and manipulations that culminated in terrorism. While
terrorism has certainly been defeated, these leaders and structures not
only survive, but are once again in a position to control the destinies of
Punjab."
Mr Gill states: "Even today in the Golden Temple - the holiest shrine of
the Sikhs - elected re representatives of the Panth (SGPC) present saropas
to honour the families of those who inflicted this terror and they still
described as martyrs of the Panth. lie attitudes of a large number of
Sikhs, particularly of the Sikh religious and political leadership has it
best, remained ambivalent in the face of these activities.
"Even today, a mythology of oppression, of torment and of martyrdom is
being invented in the Punjab around those who spoke only with the
Kalashnikov and the bomb. And while the Government scampers around to
restore properties to the families of terrorists in order to heal the
wounds, no one speaks of the wounds of tens of thousands who were victims
of terror in the State," he writes.
"It is such ambivalence that makes the Sikh people vulnerable to its
seduction a ,Gain," he asserts while insisting that he was not drawing a
doomsday scenario for Punjab. The former police chief said: "I do find a
slow but definite change amongst the younger and better educated Sikhs.
Once the Jathedar culture is finally dispensed with, the myths will
automatically be discarded and things will improve."
He said: "The Knights of Falsehood is a call to all Sikhs to introspect
deeply, and consult actual tenets of the faith and then decide - and openly
declare - whether the pattern of the venal politics (the Akali leadership)
and its hideous manifestation in terror (the Khalistanis) are consistent
with the teachings of the Gurus."
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