The Hon (Justice) Louise Arbour

High Commissioner  and Acting High Commissioner

United Nations High Commission for Human Rights

Palais des Nations

CH 1211 Geneva 10

SWITZERLAND

7^th April, 2004

Your Excellency Madam Justice Arbour,

and Acting High Commissioner

HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS IN PARTICULAR OF SIKHS IN THEIR HOLY AND HISTORICAL LAND, PUNJAB, AND IN GENERAL THE NON-HINDU MINORITIES IN PREDOMINANTLY HINDU INDIA

We, the Sikhs of Switzerland, European countries and North America, would like to apprise you, your Excellency, of human rights abuses of the Sikhs and other non-Hindu minorities in India which have taken place since 15th August, 1947. This was the day when the British India authorities transferred political power to the ‘unelected’ Hindu leadership and left the non-Hindu minorities, especially the Sikhs, at the mercy of the majority community, the Hindus. Since receiving the political power from the British Empire, despite the protest of the Sikhs at large and their leadership for not returning their sovereign and independent Sikh Raj of their forefathers and monarch, Ranjit Singh (1799-1849), the predominantly Hindu India has exterminated more than 1.4 to 2.3 million Sikhs (Singh S 1995 The Sikhs in History ISBN 0-96475555-0-5; Dilgeer HS and Sekhon AS 1992 The Sikhs’ Struggle for Sovereignty An Historical Perspective (ed) A T Kerr ISBN 0-9695964-1-3 University of Alberta P O, Edmonton, AB T6G 2S5, Canada; Sekhon AS Dilgeer HS 1999 A White Paper On Khalistan (A True Story) The Sikh Nation (ed) AT Kerr ISBN 0-9695964-8-0; Sekhon AS Dilgeer HS 2002 India Kills the Sikhs, 3^rd Ed, ISBN 0-9695964-9-9). Since the brutal military “Operation Bluestar” of June, 1984, more than 260,000 Sikh infants, children, youth, male and female folks have been slaughtered [Int J Sikh Affairs 10(2): 27-29, 2000 ISSN 1481-5435; Sekhon AS 2000 Proc 8th Sikh Edu Conf, Toronto, ON, Sept 23; Walia AS Sudan TS 2001 Genesis of State Terrorism in Punjab. Released by Justice A S Bains, < This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ; July 14, 2001; Kumar RN et al.2003 Reduced To Ashes: The Insurgency and Human Rights in Punjab ISBN 99933-53-57-4 <www.safhr.org>]. Likewise, Hindu India has systematically killed other non-Hindu minorities (more than 200,000 Muslims; over 80,000 Kashmiri Muslims since 1988; more than 200,000 Christians; hundreds of thousands of Dalits, adivaasis (aboriginals of India), in numerous genocides, pogroms, and staged encounters. The most recent examples of the state sponsored pogroms are the killings of Sikhs in Chitisinghpora in Kashmir in February, 2000; killings of 6 Sikhs in Kashmir in February, 2001; beheading of a Sikh in Kashmir in March, 2001; destruction of 6 Mosques in Kanpur, U P, and Bhilwara (Asind), Rajasthan (http://www.indianexpress.com; 2001; The Hon Edolphus Towns, Member of Congress (MC). Indian Government Found Responsible for Burning Sikh Homes and Temple in Kashmir. The US House of Representatives, June 27, 2001; The Hon Dan Burton, MC and Chairman, US House Government Committee. Indian Duplicity and Hypocrisy Exposed, House of Representatives, 31st July, 2001; The Hon Edolphus Towns, MC Indian Minorities Seeking Their Own States. The US House of Representatives, 107th Congress, July 11, 2001; The Hon Cynthia A McKinney, MC Self-Determination For Sikh Homeland Discussed on Capitol Hill, The US House of Representatives, June 28, 2001.); slaughtering of 16 Muslims by the police; burning of the Muslim holy scripture, The Quran Shariff, in New Delhi, Patiala, and Amritsar, Punjab (March 24, 2000 <post #4279 & 4314, (www.yahoogroups.com/group/sikhyouth>.

Additionally, the excesses of the Indian forces can be summarized as follows:

On 5th November, 1978, the Hindu India police of Delhi fired at a Sikh procession and killed four Sikhs, including the president of the Delhi Akali Party [Sekhon AS and Dilgeer HS 1999 A White Paper On Khalistan (A True Story) The Sikh Nation (ed) A T Kerr ISBN 0-9695964-8-0]. Acting Mukh-Sewadar, or Chief of Akal Takht Sahib, the Supreme Seat of the Sikh Polity, Amritsar, Singh Sahib Bhai Gurdev Singh Kaunke, was abducted on 20th December, 1993, tortured, killed and his body dumped in a canal on 3rd January, 1994.

On October 27, 1995, the Human Rights activist of the Akali Dal (Badal), Sardar Jaswant Singh Khalra, was killed at the Chhabal police station, Amritsar. His body was thrown into the Harike Canal. A police officer, A. S. Sandhu (supposedly committed suicide), abducted a Sikh religious leader, Charan Singh, tortured him and was made to dispose of his body. Earlier, the same police officer had abducted Charan Singh’s brother and his driver. The latter was killed by tying his legs to two jeeps, which were driven off in opposite directions.

A former Punjab administration headed by a corrupt Sikh, Prakash Sinh Badal, attacked the Darbar Sahib Complex (mistakenly known as the Golden Temple Complex) on 7th February, 1998, desecrated its sanctity and deposed, using his state powers, the democratically elected president of the Shiromani Gurdwara Prabhandhak Committee. Shortly thereafter, Badal forcibly removed the Mukh-Sewadar or Chief of Akal Takht Sahib, the Supreme Seat of the Sikh Polity, Bhai Ranjit Singh. The administration of Prakash Sinh Badal, has spent more than 20 million rupees for legal fees to protect the police officers who participated in the genocide of the Sikhs.

On February 6, 2000, the death of a Dalit youth in police custody in Morinda, Ludhiana, was horrifying. He was killed in cold blood because he objected to police’s drinking session at a public place. This incidence revived memories of the dark period in the history of Punjab when countless innocent young men were killed in false encounters, but police records turned them into ruthless terrorists.

A mother of six sons, Bibi Jaswant Kaur, lost her husband in 1987. Three of her six sons succumbed to tuberculosis. The other three were abducted and killed by Punjab police. One of the three sons, Pragat Singh, 23-yrs-old, was arrested in 1987, kept in captivity for 14 months. After his release police raided his home on 9th September, 1988, and shot him dead. The eldest son, Jagir Singh, 25-yrs-old, working as a volunteer in a Taran Taran Gurdwara, was taken by the police and did not return. The youngest son, Mohinder Singh (20-yrs-old) ) was with the religious man, Baba Charan Singh (see above). He was abducted by the police on 14th June, 1991 and died in police custody. Jaswant Kaur has tried all possible avenues to get justice, but has had no luck ( This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ; March 20, 2001; post #4181;

http://www.yahoogroups.com/group/sikhyou

International Journal of Sikh Affairs 14(1), 2004ã

Even outside India, Sikhs continue to be harassed by the Indian government and its allies, according to the Hon Edolphus Towns, MC (Extensions of Remarks - February 27, 2001). Miscreants stormed a church and ransacked the premises while a spiritual meeting and prayers were in progress in Hyderabad, A P (www.burningpunjab.com; 24th March, 2001).

They A group of men killed their rape victim, a mother of seven, in the village of Singana and then gouged out the eyes of two witnesses in India's lawless eastern state of Bihar, the Press Trust of India reported Thursday (February 8, 2001; AFP). The rapists then used the woman's sickle to hack her to death. Then attacked four labourers who witnessed the crime.

Since 1998, Christian missionaries including one from Australia (Father Graham Stains), his 8- & 10-yr-old sons, and Roman Catholic nuns, have been killed, burnt alive or raped by the Hindu fundamentalists. The burning, destruction and demolishing of the Houses of God of the non-Hindu minorities, the Sikh Gurdwaras, Churches and Mosques, looting and desecrating of the holy and historical places of the non-Hindu minorities are the modus operandi of successive Indian administrations and state-sponsored hoodlums (Hon John T Doolittle, MC India Coalition Partner Threaten To Engulf Country In Violence, House of Representatives, July 27, 2000, The US Congress; Hon Edolphus Towns, MC July 27, 2000. Christian Persecution in India, House of Representatives, The US Congress).

A train carrying Sikh pilgrims and the Sikh holy scriptures, Guru Granth Sahib, was attacked in June, 2001, by militant Hindu hoodlums in Uttarpara, West Bengal. The Hindu hoodlums stoned the Sikh pilgrims, burned the Holy Scriptures, and tried to set fire to the train (Press Release: Council of Khalistan. Train Attack Is Wake-Up Call for Sikh Nation, June 27, 2001

The above are only a few of hundreds of thousands of cases to bring to your kind attention, your Excellency. We hereby request that you dispatch a fact finding mission to India to assess in depth the crimes committed against humanity, by armed and law-enforcing agencies in ‘uniforms’ and bring the criminals before the International Court of Justice in the same way as the U N has done to punish the criminals of the Rwanda and Serbia massacres in 2000; S. Milosevic of Serbia in July 2001; the former Serb police chief, Steven Todorovic, who pleaded guilty for torturing, murdering and sexually assaulting Muslims and Croats (National Post, 1^st August, 2001, p A11); and Radislav Krstic for the Srebrenica genocide of Muslims in 1995 (National Post, August 3, 2001, p A3). The UN tribunal has taken a landmark decision recently to include “sex torture as a war crime” (National Post, February, 23, 2001). Also, the UN’s Secretary-General, His Excellency Kofi Annan’s interview (Time, 4th September, 2000) will be welcomed by the justice-loving peoples of our civilized world that “those who commit crimes and those who watch as bystanders are equally responsible for the crime taking place.” What we have brought to your attention, your Excellency, is the tip of the iceberg of the human rights abuses, religious persecution (s), rapes, humiliation, dehumanization and crimes committed by the state-sanctioned armed personnel of what our civilized world knows as the “largest democracy” in the world, India. A leading magazine has pointed out that “India is ruled by rascals.” “Many Indians silently witness their country’s unlawful events. Several members of the ruling party’s youth wing have in the past been charged with rapes and kidnapping. Officials respond that all parties have their thugs. Politicians use thugs to capture polling booths and stuff ballot boxes (The Economist, 15th July, 1995, p. 26).” According to the Hon Dana Rohrabacher, for the Sikhs, Kashmiri Muslims, and other minorities “India might as well be Nazi Germany”(Press Release: Council of Khalistan, Washington DC; June 27, 2001 < This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it >). Another Sikh, Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar, is about to be put to death in India for a crime even India admitted he didn't commit (Hon Edolphus TOWNS, MC. Proc House of Representatives, Washington DC, 18^th March, 2003).

We also request that you bring to justice the deceased or living politicians of Indian administrations (Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Chandershekhar, V P Sinh, Dev Gowda, P V Rao, A B Vajpayee and their cabinet colleagues, including Narendra Modi and his cabinet colleagues responsible for the Gujarat Massacre of Muslims (February to November, 2002), and/or appointees like HKL Bhagat, Jagdish Tytler, Arun Nehru, SD Sharma, SS Ray, Boota Singh, LK Advani, GL Nanda, Surjit Barnala, Balwant Singh, Beant Singh, PD Singh, JS Chohan, Surender Nath, Prakash Sinh Badal, GS Tohra, HS Longowal, to cite but a few; police officers JF Rebeiro, KPS Gill, Sarbjit Singh, Sumedh Saini (Senior Superintendent Police), DR Bhatti for the killings of Professor Rajinder Pal Singh Gill (Bulara), Dr Gurnam Singh Buttar and others, Swarn Ghotna, Gobind Ram, AS Sandhu, RS Bhullar, Joginder Singh, Raghbir Singh; armed forces personnel like K Sunderji, AS Vaidya, KS Brar, RS Dayal, JS Bhullar, Arjan Singh, and their subordinates (Report To The Nation: Oppression in Punjab. Library of Congress Card No. 86-60058, January, 1986; Gurtej Singh 2000 Chakarvyuh: Web of Indian Secularism ISBN 81-85815-14-3; Int J  Sikh Affairs Vol 9, No. 1, 1999 ISSN 1481-5435).

We look forward to hearing from you and to your prompt action on the crimes committed against ALL humanity.

With warmest regards and best wishes.

Respectfully submitted,

The Sikhs of Switzerland

Signed by: Pritpal Singh Khalsa

Khalsa Human Rights of the United Kingdom

Signed by: Gurjit Singh Samra

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Human Rights Wing

Signed by: Dr Awatar Singh Sekhon

Council of Khalistan,

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730 – 24^th Street, NE Suite 310

Washington, DC 20006 USA

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The Sikh Educational Trust

Signed by: Dr Awatar Singh Sekhon

Box 60246, Univ AB P. O

Managing Editor and Acting Editor in Chief

Edmonton, AB, CANADA

International Journal of  Sikh Affairs

T6G 2S5

ISSN 1481-5435

Sikh Youth of Belgium

Signed by: Jagdish Singh Khalsa

Dal Khalsa International, Organizing Secretary

Signed by: Jasvir Singh Khalsa