For­mer mil­i­tant leader and ide­o­logue on Sikh free­dom thought, Bhai Daljit Singh de­nounces the In­dian gov­ern­ment de­ci­sion on the abol­ish­ment of Ar­ti­cle 370 and 35A and fears the for­ma­tion of a sin­gu­lar ho­moge­nous iden­tity at the hands of the Brah­man­i­cal forces in In­dia. 

ON 5 AU­GUST 2019, the In­dian union gov­ern­ment abol­ished Ar­ti­cle 370 and 35A of the In­dian Con­sti­tu­tion. This is an in­di­ca­tion of the next step be­ing taken by the pre­sent Hin­dutva van­guard in es­tab­lish­ing a sin­gu­lar, ho­moge­nous iden­tity. It is the ba­sic in­stinct of the Brah­man­i­cal forces to ab­sorb the dis­tinct re­li­gious, so­cial and cul­tural en­ti­ties, in or­der to sub­ju­gate them.

This move should be seen as the com­plete oc­cu­pa­tion and cap­ture of Kash­mir into the In­dian State, a step be­yond the pre­vail­ing de­pen­dence that it has ex­pe­ri­enced thus far. This is against the will of the Kash­miri peo­ple and is thus im­moral, serv­ing a death knell to the course of jus­tice.

This ac­tion is a deep wound to the con­science of the Kash­miri peo­ple who have been phys­i­cally op­pressed for a long time.

This cur­rent In­dian Gov­ern­ment is scorn­ing its own con­sti­tu­tion, leg­is­la­ture and ju­di­ciary on the one hand, whilst dis­miss­ing in­ter­na­tion­ally-recog­nised processes on the other. In fact, the In­dian State is break­ing its own diplo­matic promises on Kash­mir and the United Na­tions Res­o­lu­tion, through this course of ac­tion. It is a sign of power that this Hin­dutva dic­ta­tor­ship holds to ig­nore the pre­vi­ous sit­u­a­tion.

The Cen­tral Gov­ern­men­t’s act of ig­nor­ing the will of the peo­ple, writ­ten agree­ments, in­ter­na­tional mon­i­tor­ing and con­cerns of world peace while un­der­tak­ing this course of ac­tion raises grave ap­pre­hen­sions that it could uni­lat­er­ally crush the rights of any na­tion­al­ity.

All re­li­gions, cul­tural and eth­nic na­tion­al­i­ties, Bahu­jans, trib­als and other dis­tinct en­ti­ties of this sub­con­ti­nent need to de­lib­er­ate and act jointly in this sit­u­a­tion.

Af­ter re­moval of Ar­ti­cle 370 and Ar­ti­cle 35A, there are ap­pre­hen­sions of use of armed forces to en­force de­mo­graphic changes in Kash­mir, which would be an­other grave in­jus­tice to the Kash­miri peo­ple.

While peo­ples and na­tions across the globe are try­ing to bring peace to South Asia, the im­moral and ar­ro­gant lead­er­ship of the In­dian State con­tin­ues to take a path to­wards war, where the risk of nu­clear con­flict is very real –that which will be weath­ered by one and all.

We sup­port the Kash­miri peo­ple’s right to self-de­ter­mi­na­tion.

At this dif­fi­cult and sen­si­tive time, we stand in Ar­das -sup­pli­ca­tion, for a res­o­lu­tion that ful­fils the as­pi­ra­tions of the peo­ple of Kash­mir.

In ac­cor­dance with Gur­mat -the Sikh way of life, every Sikh should raise his or her voice for the rights of the op­pressed Kash­miri peo­ple.

We an­tic­i­pate that every move­ment and or­gan­i­sa­tion that seeks jus­tice in In­dia should fear­lessly and boldly speak out against this move on Kash­mir by the In­dian state.

It is our un­der­stand­ing that the peo­ple of the World will in­ter­vene in Kash­mir to en­sure that the col­lec­tive prin­ci­ples of peace, free­dom and jus­tice are up­held in Kash­mir and else­where.