With a few days to go be­fore In­di­a’s Re­pub­lic Day on 26 Jan­u­ary, pro-Sikh free­dom body Dal Khalsa has shared a poignant let­ter writ­ten to French Pres­i­dent Em­manuel Macron sched­uled to be the chief guest at In­di­a’s 75th Re­pub­lic Day cel­e­bra­tions. The mis­sive con­veys the Sikh com­mu­ni­ty’s dis­ap­point­ment and as his visit seems to be a fait ac­com­pli, it urges Pres­i­dent Macron to ad­dress cru­cial is­sues dur­ing his visit. The or­ga­ni­za­tion’s ap­peal sig­ni­fies a crit­i­cal plea for in­ter­na­tional in­ter­ven­tion in the Sikh com­mu­ni­ty’s on­go­ing strug­gle for jus­tice and recog­ni­tion. WSN re­ports.

The cir­cum­stances and de­vel­op­ments in the last year have seen Sikh bod­ies go­ing in­ter­na­tional in their ap­proach to ad­dress­ing burn­ing is­sues con­cern­ing Sikh iden­tity and Sikh rights in a con­certed at­tempt to re­solve the po­lit­i­cal con­flict be­tween Sikhs and In­dia.

Dal Khal­sa’s let­ter to Pres­i­dent Macron, sent through the French Am­bas­sador in In­dia, penned by the par­ty’s Sec­re­tary for Po­lit­i­cal Af­fairs, Kan­war Pal Singh, high­lights the global scrutiny of the In­dian gov­ern­men­t’s role in transna­tional re­pres­sion.

The or­ga­ni­za­tion voices the Sikh com­mu­ni­ty’s con­cerns, stat­ing, “Your ac­cep­tance to be the chief guest at In­di­a’s Re­pub­lic Day cel­e­bra­tions has acutely dis­ap­pointed the Sikhs world­wide.”

 “Sikhs are fac­ing a live threat to their ex­is­tence and iden­tity, not only in Pun­jab and In­dia but also in other coun­tries. Now that you have de­cided and as per­haps there is no look­ing back, we urge you to have a di­a­logue with your In­dian coun­ter­part In­dian Prime Min­is­ter Naren­dra Modi dur­ing your visit to New Delhi on transna­tional tar­geted killings of Sikhs, im­ple­ment­ing equal pris­oner norms and laws in the coun­try, restor­ing re­spect for hu­man rights and es­pe­cially em­pha­siz­ing the Sikh de­mand for amend­ing In­di­a’s con­sti­tu­tion to give rest­less peo­ples of var­i­ous na­tion­al­i­ties the right to self-de­ter­mi­na­tion un­der UN covenants.”

Dal Khalsa has em­pha­sized the se­vere threat to Sikh ex­is­tence and iden­tity, not only in Pun­jab and In­dia but glob­ally, cit­ing in­stances of ex­tra­ju­di­cial killings by In­dian se­cret ser­vice agents. The let­ter re­it­er­ates the Sikh com­mu­ni­ty’s strug­gle in Pun­jab for Sikh sov­er­eignty.

Sikhs are fac­ing a live threat to their ex­is­tence and iden­tity, not only in Pun­jab and In­dia but also in other coun­tries.

Kan­war Pal Singh, Sec­re­tary for Po­lit­i­cal Af­fairs, Dal Khalsa

Fur­ther­more, Kan­war Pal Singh has high­lighted that while In­dia marks 26 Jan­u­ary with pomp and glory, In­di­a’s mi­nori­ties and na­tion­al­i­ties, in­clud­ing Sikhs, ob­serve it as ‘Black Re­pub­lic Day’ due to In­di­a’s dis­crim­i­na­tory and fas­cist poli­cies.

Re­it­er­at­ing its re­solve to place things in proper per­spec­tive, Dal Khalsa has an­nounced a peace­ful protest march in Moga on Jan­u­ary 26, to re­call and re­it­er­ate the con­sti­tu­tional in­jus­tices and dis­crim­i­na­tion faced by mi­nori­ties, in­clud­ing Sikhs.

Dal Khal­sa’s cor­re­spon­dence with Pres­i­dent Macron also touches upon re­cent in­ter­na­tional in­ci­dents, in­clud­ing the as­sas­si­na­tion of Cana­dian Sikh ac­tivist Hard­eep Singh Ni­j­jar and the in­dict­ment of an In­dian na­tional in the US for plot­ting against US cit­i­zen Gur­pat­want Singh Pannu. These events, ac­cord­ing to Dal Khalsa, have placed In­dia un­der sus­pi­cion, with the group ex­press­ing fears and ap­pre­hen­sions re­gard­ing In­di­a’s re­sponse to these in­ci­dents.

Not stop­ping at just the par­tic­i­pa­tion of the vis­it­ing dig­ni­tary at the 26 Jan­u­ary events, Dal Khalsa has ques­tioned the French gov­ern­men­t’s con­tin­u­ous sup­port for In­di­a’s bid to join the UN Se­cu­rity Coun­cil.

Speak­ing to World Sikhs News, with­out minc­ing words, Kan­war Pal Singh said, “If with­out a seat at the high­est level at the United Na­tions, In­dia is un­tame­able and un­ac­count­able, should In­dia gain a foothold at the Se­cu­rity Coun­cil, we shud­der to think of the con­se­quences  that will be­fall mi­nori­ties and na­tion­al­i­ties, en­dan­ger­ing peace in South Asia ex­press­ing con­cerns over po­ten­tial threats to mi­nor­ity rights and peace in South Asia.”

“The carte blanche en­dorse­ment of In­di­a’s at­tempt to be a mem­ber of the UN Se­cu­rity Coun­cil by the gov­ern­ment of France un­der­scores the need for bet­ter com­pre­hen­sion of the pos­si­ble de­struc­tion In­dia can cause to peo­ples’ rights.”

“The carte blanche en­dorse­ment of In­di­a’s at­tempt to be a mem­ber of the UN Se­cu­rity Coun­cil by the gov­ern­ment of France un­der­scores the need for bet­ter com­pre­hen­sion of the pos­si­ble de­struc­tion In­dia can cause to peo­ples’ rights.”

As French Sikh res­i­dents, in­clud­ing cit­i­zens, face se­ri­ous mis­han­dling of their iden­tity is­sues with var­i­ous gov­ern­ment de­part­ments in France, Kan­war Pal Singh also sought the vis­it­ing dig­ni­tary’s in­ter­ven­tion to re­spect Sikh iden­tity and make lo­cal munci­pal and state reg­u­la­tions ac­cord­ingly.

As French Sikh res­i­dents, in­clud­ing cit­i­zens, face se­ri­ous mis­han­dling of their iden­tity is­sues with var­i­ous gov­ern­ment de­part­ments in France, it is time for France to re­spect Sikh iden­tity and frame rules and reg­u­la­tions ac­cord­ingly.

With this timely let­ter, Dal Khalsa has once again fo­cused in­ter­na­tional at­ten­tion on the plight of the Sikh com­mu­nity and it would be in­ter­est­ing to see if France up­holds its com­mit­ment to equal­ity, lib­erty, and fra­ter­nity in ad­dress­ing the is­sues raised.