Sikh or­gan­i­sa­tions in home­land Pun­jab and the Sikh Di­as­pora world­wide are us­ing let­ter diplo­macy to Prime Min­is­ters, Pres­i­dents and par­lia­men­tar­i­ans to en­gage dis­cus­sion on sub­stan­tive is­sues af­fect­ing the lives and hu­man rights.  While the farm­ers’ is­sue has not been re­solved, hun­dreds of farmer pro­tes­tors have been ar­rested, many have been tor­tured and the ha­rass­ments con­tinue. The re­cent events at the nearly two and a half-month long Kissan Mor­cha on the out­skirts of New Delhi have seen many such moves across the spec­trum. The World Sikh News is ex­am­in­ing why the al­ter­na­tive Sikh lead­er­ship is do­ing this and how is it im­pact­ing of­fi­cial and non-of­fi­cial opin­ion world­wide. WSN ed­i­tor Jag­mo­han Singh re­views the cor­re­spon­dence by Dal Khalsa spokesper­son Kan­warpal Singh to Joe Biden af­ter he took oath as Pres­i­dent of the United States of Amer­ica.

INDIA HAS A LARGER THAN LIFE IM­AGE. In­di­a’s vi­o­lence to­wards its peo­ple is over­shad­owed by the mis­nomer of non-vi­o­lent In­dia. The vast mar­ket po­ten­tial of the coun­try helps In­dia in re­tain­ing that im­age. In­dia has been liv­ing in such ivory tow­ers for long.  The use of so­cial me­dia tech­nol­ogy by despots and de­mo­c­ra­t­i­cally-elected au­to­crats is com­ing back to them with a vi­cious­ness that they and their bunch did not imag­ine.

Ac­tivists of the Dal Khalsa are sup­port­ing the Kissan Mor­cha and its de­mand for the re­peal of farm laws. How­ever, with­out in­dulging di­rectly with the on­go­ings at the Mor­cha on the bor­ders of Delhi, as re­flected in its let­ter to US Pres­i­dent Joe Biden, Dal Khalsa says that it con­sid­ers it im­por­tant to let the in­ter­na­tional com­mu­nity know the ram­i­fi­ca­tions of the farm­ers’ ag­i­ta­tion on the rights of the peo­ple of Pun­jab, the neigh­bour­hood and its pos­si­ble im­pact on the civil and po­lit­i­cal rights of peo­ple across In­dia.

Kan­warpal Singh -spokesper­son of the Dal Khalsa, while wel­com­ing the new Pres­i­dent and Vice-Pres­i­dent Ka­mala Har­ris and the rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the De­moc­rats ex­tends greet­ings say­ing, “your his­toric vic­tory de­feat­ing a pres­i­dent who had placed hate on his agenda has been wel­comed, not only in the United States but even the rest of world.”

Tak­ing a cue from the in­au­gural speech words of Joe Biden – “We must end this un­civil war…” Dal Khalsa spokesper­son says in his let­ter to the Pres­i­dent, “Such wars are hap­pen­ing around the world -only the scale and play­ers are dif­fer­ent. In home­land Pun­jab and in In­dia we are fac­ing an “un­civil war” un­leashed by the In­dian state and state play­ers. Po­lit­i­cal un­rest, sup­pres­sion of as­pi­ra­tions of peo­ple, en­act­ing anti-peo­ple, anti-farmer laws putting at risk the liveli­hoods of thou­sands, de­nial of hu­man rights -are all part of the ‘un­civil war’ against the Sikhs of Pun­jab, the Kash­miris, Na­gas and other eth­nic and re­gional iden­ti­ties.”

Sig­nif­i­cantly, the Dal Khalsa spokesper­son does not limit him­self only to the prob­lems and as­pi­ra­tions of the peo­ple of Pun­jab but also of other na­tion­al­i­ties. As the hu­man rights sit­u­a­tion in Kash­mir con­tin­ues to grow from bad to worse, the Dal Khalsa mis­sive reads, “Kash­mir con­tin­ues to be gov­erned as a colony an­nexed by In­dia, the pro-free­dom lead­er­ship is in pris­ons, the In­dian mil­i­tary man­ning the state in large num­bers. In­dia has shown scant con­cern for its in­ter­na­tional oblig­a­tion to the UN agree­ment on plebiscite in Kash­mir.”

“Dal Khalsa hopes -on Joe Biden’s day of “his­tory and hope” that while deal­ing with your cur­rent do­mes­tic ter­ror­ism threat, you will even take steps to ar­rest state ter­ror­ism, across the globe, in­clud­ing In­dia.”

Ex­press­ing sat­is­fac­tion at the role of Joe Biden’s team who, at the be­hest of Sikh-Amer­i­cans “de­clared the up­hold­ing of hu­man rights and the tra­di­tions of democ­racy across the globe.” Kan­warpal Singh com­mented, “This gives us hope. We hope that while you ad­dress the con­cerns of Sikh-Amer­i­cans in your coun­try, you would also take up the con­cerns of the in­ter­na­tional Sikh com­mu­nity.”

Re­it­er­at­ing that ter­ror­ism knows no ge­o­graph­i­cal bound­aries but state ter­ror­ism is per­pe­trated os­ten­si­bly as pro­tec­tion of law and or­der sit­u­a­tion within the bor­ders of a coun­try, by fas­cist-lean­ing gov­ern­ments, Kan­warpal Singh con­cludes by urg­ing the US Pres­i­dent Joe Biden and Vice-Pres­i­dent Ka­mala Har­ris, “Dal Khalsa hopes -on your day of “his­tory and hope” that while deal­ing with your cur­rent do­mes­tic ter­ror­ism threat, you will even take steps to ar­rest state ter­ror­ism, across the globe, in­clud­ing In­dia.”

So­cial me­dia tech­nol­ogy used by the state ma­chin­ery by despots and de­mo­c­ra­t­i­cally-elected au­to­crats is get­ting it back in their own coin now.

In re­sponse to the rou­tine tele­phonic con­ver­sa­tion with US Pres­i­dent Joe Biden, Naren­dra Modi has tweeted that, “Joe Biden and I are com­mit­ted to a rules-based in­ter­na­tional or­der.”  Kan­war Pal Singh, while speak­ing to the WSN on this tweet re­torted, “The US Pres­i­dent and ad­min­is­tra­tion must en­sure that the In­dian Prime Min­is­ter sticks to his words.”