Sikhs demand Nov 3 be declared as Martyrs’ Day

Sikhs push for Martyrs’ Day, in wake of the Sikhs’ killing in India in 1984.

LAHORE: Hundreds of Sikhs on Wednesday demanded the government of Pakistan to observe November 3 as the Martyrs’ Day, in wake of the Sikhs’ killing in India in 1984.

They had gathered to observe the memorial service on the 26th anniversary of the martyrs of the killings.

They also demanded that the government announce a public holiday on this day to honour the Sikh citizens of the country.

The memorial service was organised by the Sikhs Youth Organisation (SYO) and the Pakistan Sikh Gurdwara Prabhandhak Committee at Gurdwara Dera Sahib.

Highlighting the importance of the day, SYO President Sardar Kalyan Singh said that the Indian government under Prime Minister Indra Gandhi had ordered the targeting of the Sikhs’ sacred place Akal Takht (Golden Temple) on June 6, 1984.

The attack, he said, resulted in a genocide.

He said that the Sikhs everywhere protested. Four months later Gandhi was killed by two of her Sikh body guards on October 30, he added.

He said that after Gandhi’s assassination, Hindus turned Delhi’s roads red with Sikhs’ blood. “2,733 Sikhs were martyred in three days in Delhi,” he recalled.

Besides those stabbed, beheaded and shot dead, more than 100 Sikhs were thrown into the furnaces of Bokaro Steel Plant, he added. He said that 175 cases were registered, but families still waited for justice.

Dr Sardar Mimpal Singh Pakistan, president of the Pakistan Sikh Students and a senior physician at the Mayo Hospital said that if their life and property were not safe in India in the 1980’s, today they weren’t safe in the rest of the world either.

He said that governments across the world should take extra measures to protect their Sikh citizens’ lives and interests.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 4^th, 2010.