Af­ter 33 years, when the fam­i­lies of the four Sikh youth killed in what has come to be known as Saka Nako­dar, faced the me­dia for the first time yes­ter­day, they sought an Ac­tion Taken Re­port on the Jus­tice Gur­nam Singh En­quiry Re­port into the killings and des­e­cra­tion of Guru Granth Sahib on 2 Feb­ru­ary 1986, which re­port was re­port­edly tabled in the Pun­jab Leg­isla­tive As­sem­bly on 5 March 2001 with­out dis­cus­sion and de­bate.

What do fam­i­lies do when a kin of their fam­ily is killed while protest­ing the sac­ri­lege of Guru Granth Sahib? What can the par­ents do when a gov­ern­ment sur­rep­ti­tiously ta­bles the Re­port of a Com­mis­sion –The Jus­tice Gur­nam Singh Re­port, on the floor of the Pun­jab as­sem­bly with­out any de­bate what­so­ever and with­out any Ac­tion Taken Re­port, which is manda­tory un­der the Com­mis­sions of In­quiry Act? It is a clear case of ‘those were sup­posed to pros­e­cute were ac­tu­ally tak­ing steps to pro­tect.’ Fur­ther­more, they pro­gressed from pro­tec­tion to pro­mo­tion by en­abling the guilty po­lice and ad­min­is­tra­tive of­fi­cials to oc­cupy higher posts in the gov­ern­ment.

Speak­ing to me­dia at the Ja­land­har Press Club, Baldev Singh –the fa­ther of Ravin­der Singh Lit­tran, the sis­ter of Jhilman Singh and oth­ers asked the Con­gress gov­ern­ment asked the Con­gress gov­ern­ment led by Cap­tain Amarinder Singh to set up a Spe­cial In­ves­tiga­tive Team on the lines of such a team set up for the Be­hbal Kalan fir­ing that killed two youth in Oc­to­ber 2015.

All these 33 years, the fam­i­lies have lived in pain, run­ning from pil­lar to post for jus­tice to no avail. The lead pro­vided by the in­ves­tiga­tive re­port­ing of the then Tri­bune se­nior cor­re­spon­dent and now leg­is­la­tor Kan­war Sandhu, who quoted the re­port, pro­vided the key link to pur­sue the case and ob­tain an ac­knowl­edge­ment from the gov­ern­ment that the Jus­tice Gur­nam Singh re­port was qui­etly tabled way back in 2001 by the then Chief Min­is­ter Parkash Singh Badal.

The then Ad­di­tional Deputy Com­mis­sioner-cum-mag­is­trate of Ja­land­har Dar­bar Singh Guru was pa­tro­n­ised by the Shi­ro­mani Akali Dal and was given a plum po­lit­i­cal post in the party. The then SSP Mo­hammed Izhar Alam was also pa­tro­n­ised and sup­ported by the Parkash Singh Badal-led Shi­ro­mani Akali Dal. The par­ents of the four Sikh youth killed at the time in cold blood and “with­out per­mis­sion” and “with­out warn­ing” as per the Jus­tice Gur­nam Singh Re­port, namely Ravin­der Singh of Lit­tran, Bald­hir Singh of Ram­garh, Jhilman Singh of Gor­sian and Har­min­der Singh of Chlupur, told the me­dia that “the role of Dar­bara Singh Guru, Izhar Alam and all other high and low rank­ing po­lice per­son­nel needs thor­ough in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

5 Birs of Guru Granth Sahib were burnt in Nako­dar on Feb­ru­ary 2 1986 in a lo­cal Gur­d­wara. The four Sikh youth were part of the San­gat which was pro­ceed­ing to col­lect the burnt Birs for im­mer­sion, when with­out provo­ca­tion; the po­lice opened in­dis­crim­i­nate fir­ing on the crowd on 4 Feb­ru­ary 1986. While the fir­ing killed two of the youth on the spot, two oth­ers were chased and killed by the po­lice. The bod­ies were all cre­mated in a hush by the po­lice with­out in­for­ma­tion to the fam­i­lies.

“An ap­pro­pri­ate clo­sure to the case will bring peace and tran­quil­ity to the par­ents and fam­i­lies of the Sikh youth whose life was cut short in the line of their re­li­gious com­mit­ment to­wards Guru Granth Sahib. We also want the gov­ern­ment to frame fresh guide­lines to en­sure that such ac­tions by the po­lice do not re­cur in the fu­ture.”

Baldev Singh, fa­ther of Ravin­der Singh Lit­tran, mar­tyr Saka Nako­dar 1986

Through­out the last three decades, all the fam­i­lies, rel­a­tives, neigh­bours and Sikh or­ga­ni­za­tions have been ob­serv­ing an­nual prayer meet­ings co­in­cid­ing with the date of their mar­tyr­dom. The Sikh com­mu­nity has ac­corded mar­tyr sta­tus and their pho­tos adorn the his­toric Sikh Mu­seum in Am­rit­sar.  The pho­tographs of the mar­tyrs have also been por­trayed in a Gur­d­wara in the Bay area of USA.

Bow­ing be­fore peo­ples’ protests and anger over the po­lice fir­ing, the gov­ern­ment of Sur­jit Singh Bar­nala had set up the Jus­tice Gur­nam Singh Com­mis­sion, to en­quire into the Nako­dar killings as well as to go into the de­tails of the des­e­cra­tion of Sa­roops of Guru Granth Sahib. Along­side the role of the po­lice, the ac­tiv­i­ties of the Pun­jab Shiv Sena and their sup­port­ers in per­pet­u­at­ing the des­e­cra­tion was also meant to be in­ves­ti­gated.

The re­lent­less cam­paign of the vic­tim fam­i­lies has stirred the Pun­jab ad­min­is­tra­tion to act. It is in the fit­ness of things that ap­pro­pri­ate ac­tion is taken up with­out de­lay.

Though des­o­late at the way things are done by gov­ern­ments, the fam­i­lies were res­olute to get jus­tice. Baldev Singh said, “I may sub­mit that jus­tice never grows old and in­jus­tice is al­ways re­mem­bered. Peo­ples and na­tions are par­don­ing each other for in­jus­tices done in the past. It is in the fit­ness of things that as the pre­sent gov­ern­ment in Pun­jab is show­ing keen­ness to bring the Be­hbal Kalan guilty po­lice of­fi­cers to jus­tice, it should not hes­i­tate to do the same in the case of the Nako­dar killings too. Non-dis­clo­sure would lead to a col­lapse of the sys­tems of jus­tice and the spirit of equal­ity en­shrined in the Con­sti­tu­tion of In­dia.”

It is com­fort­ing to note that cut­ting across party lines, Kan­war Singh Sandhu, Harvin­der Singh Phoolka, Dr. Dharamvir Gandhi, Kul­tar Singh Sid­hwan and Gur­par­tap Singh Wadala have as­sisted the vic­tim fam­i­lies to high­light their plight.  Even at the time of the in­ci­dent in 1986, Kuldip Singh Wadala, Surinder Singh Tham­man­wal and Sur­jit Singh Min­has stood by the fam­i­lies.

Speak­ing to the World Sikh News, Baldev Singh, the fa­ther of Ravin­der Singh had the last word. He said, “An ap­pro­pri­ate clo­sure to the case will bring peace and tran­quil­ity to the par­ents and fam­i­lies of the Sikh youth whose life was cut short in the line of their re­li­gious com­mit­ment to­wards Guru Granth Sahib.” “We also want the gov­ern­ment to frame fresh guide­lines to en­sure that such ac­tions by the po­lice do not re­cur in the fu­ture.” he added.