The civilian victims of the bus killings and other atrocities committed in the Punjab, condemned by most Sikh leaders and groups alike, accelerated post-1984.
“Militants were responsible for numerous human rights abuses during the violent separatist struggle for an independent Khalistan, including the killings of Hindu and Sikh civilians, assassinations of political leaders, and the indiscriminate use of bombs leading to a large number of civilian deaths in Punjab and other parts of India. Under the cover of militancy, criminals began to coerce businessmen and landowners, demanding protection money. The Indian government responded with force, leading to numerous allegations of human rights violations.”
Human Rights Watch, October 2007.1
He was gunned down in his home by one of the terrorist gangs. ©India Today
It is difficult to describe the sheer terror of the passengers who were faced with gun-toting terrorists while travelling on one of Punjab’s buses, on the way to work or to visit loved ones and due to the way you look, they may not even make it to their destination.
On the night of the 5th of October 1983, a bus travelling from Amritsar to Delhi was hijacked by suspected Sikh terrorists near the village of Dhilwan in the Punjab, India. ‘Six Hindu passengers were taken off and gunned down at the side of the road’.2
The following day, the Punjab state government, led by Darbara Singh of the Congress (I) was dismissed and President’s rule imposed. A month later, four more Hindus would be killed in a similar fashion near a village in the Kapurthala district of Punjab.
“Such acts of butchery are not sponsored by the Sikh community as a community, nor even by the Akali Dal or (as it seems now) by Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale who has condemned the killings, as has Sant Harchand Singh Longowal. These are crimes committed by people who have a code of their own, which is independent of a recognised and articulated ideology.”
The Tribune, Editorial. December 1983.3
These massacres would continue following the army attack on the Golden Temple in June 1984 and coupled with the continuing human rights violations in the state, represented a terrible period in the history of the Punjab. The violence would claim thousands of lives, leaving many more injured and impacted India as a whole and beyond. Across the religious divide, many still carry the scars today.
A decade later, Human Rights Watch would report on a long period of dreadful massacres, based on victim testimonies:
“In some cases, the attacks are designed to drive out the minority Hindu population; militants have engaged in indiscriminate attacks in predominantly Hindu neighbourhoods and have selectively murdered Hindu civilians. Some of these attacks have been accompanied by threats to Hindus to leave Punjab. Other militant attacks appear to have been designed to cause extensive civilian casualties, and the victims have included both Sikh and Hindu civilians. Some militant groups have fired automatic weapons into residential and commercial areas and have derailed trains and exploded bombs in markets, restaurants, buses, residences, and government buildings, killing and wounding civilians. In one of the most brutal of such attacks, on June 15, 1991, militant groups opened fire with automatic weapons into two passenger trains near Ludhiana, Punjab, killing at least 75 passengers.”
Human Rights Watch, 1991.4
Other atrocities included the killing of 14 bus passengers at Muktsar in July 19855 and a further 14 Hindus and 1 Sikh killed the following July.6 At Khuda in Hoshiarpur, 24 Hindu passengers died in November 1986.7
In 6 July 1987 at Lalru, Patiala. 38 bus passengers were killed. The next day near Fatehabad, Hissar were 32 killed. “The gunmen started taunting their hostages: “Where is your Ribeiro now? You people laugh when Sikh youths are killed but look at you, all sitting like jackals.” They then insisted that everyone start, chanting Sat Naam Wahe Guru (Truth is the name of God).” In both attacks, the terrorists: ‘numbered about half-a-dozen, most of them clean-shaven. All accounts indicate that the men were in their early or mid-20s.’8
The police blamed the militant group, the Khalistan Commando Force for both killings while the underground group disowned any involvement in the killings, with its leader, General Labh Singh stating his organisation
‘We does not believe in any action that places in jeopardy the lives of innocent civilians. These two ghastly slaughters are the handy work of the same state agencies as are engaged in discrediting the Sikh community as well as inflaming the anti-Sikh sentiments among the Hindus.
General Labh Singh, leader, Khalistan Commando Force
At Jhanjoti near Amritsar in 1987, a horrific attack took place on innocent civilians. Surjit Rani’s son, Shyama, brother-in-law Devan Chand and his son, Ashok, age 30, dragged from their homes and killed. At Udhoke, near Chowk Mehta, Harjinder Singh and wife and their two daughters, Balvinder age 16 and Gurwant age 14 and brothers, Simratpal Singh age 25 and Amritpal Singh age 20 and Onkar Singh age 18 and their aunt, Puran Kaur, age 70 were all targeted. At Rahimabad in Gurdaspur, Chanchal Kumari’s husband, Subhash Chandra was killed as was Sukhdev Singh, age 42 and son of Jathedar Jeevan Singh Umranangal.9
The Scottish anthropologist, Joyce J.M. Pettigrew conducted extensive social research of the militant movement in the Punjab and noted:
“In rural Punjab, neither the various guerrilla groups nor the police has had the capability to safeguard the innocent. Its civilian had had no respite from the suffering. It has not been possible to shield it for two reasons. First, each guerrilla organisation did not have total exclusive control over a defined piece of territory, and all were competing for control of the Punjab. Civilian casualties resulted from contests between different guerrilla personalities, and their respective followers.”
Joyce J.M. Pettigrew. The Sikhs of the Punjab, Unheard Voices of State and Guerrilla Violence. 1995.10
While these attacks were going on, the police unleashed their own death squads on the population with devastating consequences.
“In September 1988, the then Director General of Police, Julio Ribeiro had acknowledged that there was an official policy of counterterrorism in which police-backed vigilantes were encouraged to use unorthodox methods to identify and eliminate terrorists. But the groups had gone out of control and by July 1989, he admitted that he ‘felt that the police officers in charge had no control over those operating in this manner and they had got out of hand…Members of these underground squads were indulging in looting and extortion of money.”
Joyce J.M. Pettigrew, ibid11
Maloy Krishna Dhar was the former Joint Director of the Intelligence Bureau, who coordinated some of the clandestine operations in the Punjab and wrote:
“The application of unconventional force by the police/paramilitary formations and some messianic intelligence operative of the Intelligence Bureau had succeeded in sending shivers of panic amongst the civilian population. They reacted in a frenetic manner with violence. The state forces responded with equal ferocity in questionable acts of plunder, extortion, inhumane torture, and murder of innocent people. At points of time, it had become difficult to differentiate between state action and terrorist action. These were not violent response to violence acts by the terrorists. These were organised acts of state repression that alienated the people and eroded their faith in the rule of law, as enshrined in the constitution.”
Maloy Krishna Dhar. Open Secrets. The Explosive Memoirs of an Indian Intelligence Officer. 2012.12
In April 1988, India’s spy agency was discovered to be have receiving secret consignments of arms from Pakistan, destined allegedly for the Punjab:
Maloy Krishna Dhar would add that by 1990:
“India’s war against its own citizens in Punjab was still not won. Pakistan was still pumping in weapons and imparting training to the directionless kamikaze type terrorist. Punjab was still smouldering. K.P.S. Gill’s ruthless operations did not remain confined to legal policing. The police, military and intelligence agencies perpetrated murder, rape, looting, inhuman torture and amassing of wealth like their terrorist counterparts did.”
Maloy Krishna Dhar, ibid13
The Left was also targeted by the militants. According to Gurpreet Singh, over 300 Communist activists were killed opposing religious extremism, on both the Sikh and Hindu sides. A popular slogan of theirs ran: “Na Hindu Raaj, Na Khalistan, Raaj Karega Mazdoor Kissan!” (“Neither Hindu state, nor Khalistan, only the working class shall rule.”).14
Amongst them were poets like Paash and Jaimal Singh Padha, leaders of the Kirti Kisan Union, both assassinated allegedly by militants in March 1988. Years later, some of the pro-Khalistan militants regretted the strategy of targeting the left. The leader of the Khalistan Commando Force (KCF), Labh Singh admitted the policy of murdering communists was a mistake and only alienated the masses from their movement.
The Punjab police recorded 21,469 deaths during the period 1981 and 1993. with the vast majority, 17,582 taking place between 1988 to 1995.15
Writing in 1992, the late author, Khushwant Singh wrote:
“Fortunately, despite the continuing violence over the past five years, the vast majority of both communities continue to live in harmony. It is significant that in all this period there has not been a single instance of Sikh mobs attacking Hindus. Unlike what happened after Mrs Gandhi’s assassination, when Hindu mobs attacked Sikhs; in the Punjab, all killings have been carried out by small gangs against Individuals.”
Khushwant Singh. My Bleeding Punjab. 1992.16
The Sectarian bus and other killings that blighted the Punjab during the 80s and 90s.
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- Protecting the Killers: A Policy of Impunity in Punjab, India: III. Background. Human Rights Watch, October 2007. ↩︎
- Khushwant Singh. A History of the Sikhs. 2nd Edition. Volume II: 1839-2004. Oxford University Press. 2004. P333. ↩︎
- Shekhar Gupta. Brutal slaying of four Hindu bus travellers takes tension in Punjab to a new high. India Today. December 15, 1983. ↩︎
- Punjab in Crisis. Human Rights Watch. 1991. P15. ↩︎
- Sikh terrorists gun down bus-load of passengers in Punjab, Delhi mobs react against Sikhs. Shekhar Gupta and Gobind Thukral. India Today. 15 August 1986. ↩︎
- Suspected Sikh Terrorists Kill 15 on India Bus. One Tempest, Los Angeles Times. 26 July 1986. ↩︎
- Sikh Gunmen Kill 24 Hindus, Wound 7 on Punjab Bus. Rone Tempest. Los Angeles Times. 1 December 1986. ↩︎
- Terrorists kill bus passengers in Punjab and Haryana mercilessly. Tavleen Singh and Sreekant Khandekar. India Today. 31 July 1987. ↩︎
- Daily roll call of death becomes an indicator of the state of Punjab. Tavleen Singh. India Today. 15 July 1987. ↩︎
- Joyce J.M. Pettigrew. The Sikhs of the Punjab, Unheard Voices of State and Guerrilla Violence. Zed Books Ltd. London and New Jersey. 1995, p103. ↩︎
- ibid. ↩︎
- Maloy Krishna Dhar. Open Secrets. The Explosive Memoirs of an Indian Intelligence Officer. 2012, p353-409. ↩︎
- ibid. ↩︎
- Gurpreet Singh. Khalistani separatists’ killings leave a legacy of sorrow in Canada and the U.S. Georgia Straight. 9 June 2013. ↩︎
- Figures quoted in Terry Milewski, Blood for Blood: Fifty Years of the Global Khalistan Project, HarperCollins, 2021. Page 103-104. ↩︎
- Khushwant Singh. My Bleeding Punjab. 1992, p160. ↩︎