Chandigarh/Fatehgarh Sahib: The ghost of Operation Blue Star and the anti-Sikh riots of 1984 returned to haunt the Congress as Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra entered Punjab Tuesday.
Gandhi, accompanied by Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh Raja Warring and leader of the opposition Partap Singh Bajwa paid obeisance at the Golden Temple in Amritsar Tuesday before starting the seven-day Punjab leg of the foot march from Fatehgarh Sahib Wednesday morning.
His visit to the Golden Temple invited scathing criticism from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) who were quick to remind him about Indira Gandhi ordering the army to enter the Golden Temple in 1984. In June of that year, then prime minister Indira Gandhi ordered the army to enter the shrine to flush out armed Sikh militants hiding inside the Harmandir Sahib Complex.
Addressing a press conference Wednesday, SAD leader Parambans Singh (Bunty Romana) accused the Congress of being the “most anti-Sikh and anti-Punjab party”. He also sought an apology from Gandhi for Operation Blue Star.
The Congress leader was also criticised for the Congress’s alleged role in the anti-Sikh riots that followed the assassination of Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards on 31 October 1984. As her successor, Rajiv Gandhi was prime minister when a spate of anti-Sikh riots rocked Delhi and parts of the country, resulting in the killings of thousands of Sikhs.
Also Read: The violent aftermath
SAD, BJP ask Sikhs to boycott yatra
“(It) seems @RahulGandhi has deliberately forgotten the gory history of his family which spewed venom against Sikh community & attacked Sri Darbar Sahib & executed #Genocide of Sikhs in 1984 which his father Rajiv Gandhi justified by saying “when a big tree falls, the earth shakes,” SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal said in a tweet Tuesday.
BJP national spokesperson Jaiveer Shergill, who was with the Congress until August last year, called on Sikhs in Punjab to boycott the yatra. “Mr Rahul Gandhi must explain, on his visit to Golden Temple, why Jagdish Tytler (has) not (been) expelled from Congress till date?” he said in a tweet.
Senior Congressman and former Union minister Jagdish Tytler is suspected to have played a major role in organising and executing the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi. His induction into the Delhi Congress’s new executive committee as a permanent invitee in October 2021 had exposed the party to widespread backlash from all sides of the political spectrum.
Under fire, Congress Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chief Warring told reporters Wednesday, “Rahul Gandhi ji loves the country, and not power (satta). If he wanted to, he could have become PM 15 years ago. But Sonia Gandhi made Manmohan Singh the prime minister. It shows how much the Congress leadership values the Sikhs.”
Warring then went on the offensive, asking reporters to name “one Sikh in the BJP government today”.
“Whether it was the country’s PM (Manmohan Singh), president Giani Zail Singh, Union home minister Buta Singh or the generals of the armed forces, Congress gave such positions to Sikhs. It made a person who used to ride a cycle and do paath (recitation) the president of the country. Do you think Rahul Gandhi wore the turban today at our request? No, he wore it because he felt like wearing it. This is their feeling towards Punjab. He wanted to visit the Golden Temple and pay his respects before starting the yatra.”
Bajwa, leader of the opposition in Punjab, said Gandhi was walking in the footsteps of the Sikh Gurus. “Guru Tegh Bahadur also sacrificed his life when Kashmiri Brahmins came to request him to save them. Rahul Gandhi is also trying to unite the country, and community and voice the poorest, and this is what Punjab has always done,” he told reporters.
Lack of clear-cut apology from Gandhis
Rahul Gandhi’s visit to the Golden Temple came as a surprise to several state Congress leaders who were expecting him to begin his march from Fatehgarh Sahib.
This was Gandhi’s second visit to the Golden Temple in less than a year. In January last year, he paid obeisance at the Golden Temple, accompanied by then-chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi and then-state Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu, following the announcement of the dates for the Punjab assembly elections. The Congress candidates declared by the party by then had also accompanied them.
Punjab: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi visits the Golden Temple in Amritsar. CM Charanjit Singh Channi and the party's state chief Navjot Singh Sidhu also accompanying him. pic.twitter.com/IQouusbqLt
— ANI (@ANI) January 27, 2022
Rahul Gandhi had also visited the Golden Temple in 2019 — alongside the then CM Captain Amarinder Singh who has since formed his own party after parting ways with the Congress — during a trip to Amritsar to attend a special programme marking 100 years of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre.
Prior to that, Gandhi had paid obeisance at the Golden Temple in June 2017. This was his first visit to the shrine after the Congress came to power in Punjab under the leadership of Captain Amarinder Singh.
Gandhi, the Congress MP from Wayanad in Kerala, had also visited the Golden Temple in 2008 before embarking on a three-day visit to the state. His multiple visits to the Golden Temple over the years invited a similar reaction from political adversaries.
Sources in the state Congress believe that Gandhi could once again be cornered into answering uncomfortable questions during the course of the yatra’s Punjab leg.
During his press conference Wednesday, SAD’s Romana said he had five questions for Rahul Gandhi.
“Will he apologise for Operation Blue Star? Will he accept the role played by Congress including his father in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots? Will he work towards the execution of Rajiv-Longowal accord of 1985 according to which Chandigarh was to become capital of Punjab? Fourth, what is Rahul Gandhi’s stand on sharing of waters between Punjab and other states and the construction of SYL (Sutlej Yamuna Link) canal and lastly, will he apologise to Punjabi youth for his false statement that 70 per cent of them are drug addicts?”
The last question was a reference to a statement Gandhi made during a visit to the state in 2012 when he claimed almost 70 per cent of the youth in Punjab were addicted to drugs.
During an election rally in Ludhiana in 1998, Sonia Gandhi had “expressed regret” over Operation Blue Star, while Manmohan Singh as prime minister had issued an apology for the same during a speech in the Rajya Sabha in 2005. Subsequently, whenever Rahul Gandhi is asked a question about the operation, he has fallen back on the regret expressed by his mother and the apology by Manmohan Singh.
However, the lack of a clear-cut apology from the Gandhis for Operation Blue Star remains central to criticism levelled against the Congress.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
Also Read: How Punjabi journalists became ‘willing tool’ for extremists and police after Blue Star