by Baldev Singh

The article by Professor Manjit Singh Sidhu about Balwant Gargi in the Sikh Virsa of June 2003 brought back flashes of the World Sikh Conference held in New York on July 30, 1984 to protest against the diabolical Operation Bluestar. The Indian Government successfully sabotaged that meeting by using professional criminals masquerading as pious Sikhs and “for sale” depraved Sikh intellectuals. The stage was occupied by General Bhullar, Saran Singh IAS (Editor of The Sikh Review and former advisor to the Governor of Assam)¹ and Professor Manjit Singh Sidhu, whereas the floor was manned by criminals holding naked swords. Professor Pritam Singh (a Marxist poet and Head of Guru Nanak Dev Studies at Guru Nanak Dev University) was sitting in the audience among others whom I didn’t know.

After successfully sabotaging the conference and duping ignorant and gullible Sikhs, General Bhullar took over as Secretary General of the World Sikh Organization. Shortly thereafter, Professor Manjit Singh Sidhu became the editor of the now defunct World Sikh News published by Dr. Gurinder Singh Grewal of Tracy, California. Professor Manjit Singh Sidhu is the kuram (from the in-laws) of K. P. S. Gill, a sadistic killer responsible for the gruesome murder of Sardar Jaswant Singh Khalra - a compassionate man devoted to the protection of human rights – who belonged to a noble family of freedom fighters.

True intellectuals are expected to guard truth, justice and human rights. They suffer hardships and while upholding these principles, many times, sacrifice their lives. Great writers represent the conscience of their times and the voice of the masses. Measured by these standards, Balwant Gargi falls far short of being an intellectual. He may me a great litterateur, but he lacked integrity. He may be the “literary tower of Bathinda,” but there was no light in it.

When asked about his reaction at the murder of thousands of innocent Sikhs throughout India after the assassination of Indira Gandhi, Gargi remarked, “Of course it is deplorable, but we should also remember that the Prime Minster of India – Rajiv Gandhi’s mother has been assassinated.” This is similar to what Rajiv Gandhi said to justify the killing of Sikhs: “When a big tree falls, the earth below trembles.” One can understand Rajiv’s utterance, as he was a politician and Indira Gandhi’s son, but for a “literary tower” to draw the parallel between the assassination of Indira Gandhi and the State sponsored murder of innocent Sikhs is incomprehensible. The “literary tower” had indeed sunk very low.

A contingent of intellectuals like Jagjit Singh Anad, Jasbir Singh Ahluwalia, Joginder Singh Puar and many others² went overseas to hoodwink the Sikh community about what had happened to Sikhs throughout India following the death of Indira Gandhi. Maybe it was a coincidence that Balwant Gargi also came to the United States to repeat the same message.

I don’t want to leave the impression that I am singling out Balwant Gargi or that he is an exception among Punjabi intellectuals. There are many like him who have grazed in the same pastures and have drunk at the same water holes. Except a few, most Punjabi writers are Marxist. For instance, Amrita Pritam, considered by some as the “nightingale of Punjab”, poured out her pain at the suffering caused by the partition of Punjab in 1947. She cried out for comfort to Waras Shah in her most celebrated poem (Today I say it to Waras Shah). People of my generation, on either side of the border, had memorized its immortal words and kept a copy of it. However, she was quiet at the blood bath of Punjabis during the last two decades. Punjab cannot be too far from the preceptory senses of a poetess, who in her younger days had communicated with Yuri Gagaran, a Soviet astronaut circling the earth in a Sputnik.

The attitude of Marxist Punjabi writers to the Government sponsored mass murder of Punjabis in general and Sikhs in particular is summed up well by the celebrated poet Surjit Patar,

If I said something, how shall I face the darkness (injustice)?
If I remained silent, what would the light-holders (intellectuals) think of me?  (Words Written in Air, p 29)

Patar is in a dilemma. Afraid of the consequences, he hesitates to speak the truth. Silence is not a good option either, for it would put to question his reputation among intellectuals. Not much can be expected from Marxist writers, who even denounced Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn for exposing the horrors of murderous communist regimes in The Gulag Archipelago.

Depravity is not limited only to Marxists; capitalists also thrive in it. For instance, people like Dr. Manmohan Singh, the former finance-minister of India. He may be a very talented economist; however I cannot admire him for his character and integrity . At the United Nations World Human Rights Conference held in Vienna in 1993, the Indian government sent its turbaned finance minister Manmohan Singh to hoodwink the world about India’s abysmal human rights record. This is what he had to say: “There are no ethnic people in India. My government recognizes no such category. India has only backward sections. India is an open book, there are no violations of human rights in India.”³ I doubt that these are his words, it sounds more like what he may have been asked to say.

People like K. P. S. Gill and Manmohan Singh have also their admirers and cheerleaders like Sir Sobha Singh’s progeny, journalist Khushwant Singh and Saran Singh, the former advisor to the Governor of Assam and the editor of The Sikh Review. Saran Singh rarely misses an opportunity to glorify Manmohan Singh⁴ and K. P. S. Gill in his magazine⁵. He may still be aspiring for a term as a Governor.⁶ In response to an article I had written for the Spokesman, the noted historian Sangat Singh commented in the letter-to-editor (November 2002, p. 14):

Prof. Baldev Singh’s paper on the misrepresentations of Sikhism at the hands of certain leftist writers (Spokesman, August 2002, Pp. 30-32) is quite interesting. In the process, he has mentioned about the presence of certain leading personalities at the World Sikh Conference in July 1984, shortly after Operation Bluestar, at New York when Lt. Gen. (Retd.) Jaswant Singh Bhullar was elected as Secretary General. As mentioned by S. Baldev Singh, the gathering had a lot of clean-shaven Sikh taxi drivers from Canada with naked swords, the Indian Intelligence Agencies planted them there.

The paper mentions a few new names: Prof. Pritam Singh, former Head of Guru Nanak Studies Department of Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar (a known leftist) and S. Saran Singh ex-IAS, now Chief Editor The Sikh Review, Calcutta. There is also mention of Prof. Manjit Singh, but he can’t be the Tohra nominee Acting Jathedar of Akal Takhat, but Prof. Manjit Singh Sidhu who was given entry visa by the Americans. I have mentioned him as Mr. S… in the fourth edition of my work, The Sikhs in History. He only participated in the initial conference in New York in July 1984 and straight away jettisoned Bhullar and Co. and went his own way.

Another person I have mentioned therein is Mr. or Prof. D… All along he was quarreling with Gen. Bhullar and after publication of my work in New York in 1995, wrote to me that my analysis of Bhullar being an implant of the Indian Intelligence Agencies was correct. He left the Bhullar company in disgust and came back to Chandigarh. Therefore, I didn’t mention these two names while writing of the World Sikh Conference in July 1984.

The addition of the names of Prof. Pritam Singh and S. Saran Singh is quite interesting. Shortly after Operation Blue Star, at the instance of RAW or Indian Intelligence Agencies, Prof. S. S. Bal was appointed Vice Chancellor of Guru Nanak Dev University, while J. S. Grewal was appointed Director, Institute of Advanced Studies at Simla. Could Prof. Pritam Singh be not a candidate for one such appointment? Communists/Marxists are known to have collaborated with Indira Gandhi in anti-Sikh pursuits. This leaves apart S. Saran Singh, ex-IAS.

I had sent a complementary copy of The Sikhs in History, New York, 1995 edn. to him (as also to about 40 others), and had the chance of meeting with him. I told him of the bitter attitude of the partisans of “World Sikh Organization” people at Ottawa, Vancouver and Edmonton in Canada in 1995, and how I escaped from getting a beating at their hands due to fortuitous circumstances. At Edmonton I was blunt in telling some such persons that it were people like them with naked swords, who were responsible for Bhullar’s election as Secretary General.

The WSO office in Ottawa served me a legal notice to remove the word ‘mole’ for Gen. Bhullar. I consulted S. Saran Singh with whom I had a chance meeting. He told me that it was a value judgment, and I should avoid it. This made me add a line to say the same thing without using the epithet. I informed WSO people that I was dropping the particular word.

Prof. Baldev Singh’s writing now has made me do serious thinking afresh. What sort of pain could such person have had over Operation Bluestar? Was S. Saran Singh angling for Governorship at the time? The mention of a letter written by S. Gurdial Singh in January and Feburary 2002 issues of The Sikh Review eulogizing KPS Gill and Sandhu (who committed suicide by throwing himself before the Himalayan Queen Train) helps to place things in their right order. Gill has mercenarily endorsed BJP’s pogrom against Muslims in Gujrat. What the Sikh Review was emphasizing was that Gill should be accepted as a consensus candidate for President of India and S. Saran Singh could still be inducted as state Governor? Is BJP listening?

Prof. Baldev Singh needs to be congratulated for giving me new information. One needs to listen to such [a] person to learn more about it.

Dr. Sangat Singh, New Delhi.

Then there are people like Ujjal Dosanjh, who talks about his gadri (revolutionary) grandfather and Marxist upbringing. However, he had no compunction in hobnobbing with corrupt and decadent Indian politicians. Sometime back a human rights activist asked me, “How come Ujjal Dosanjh didn’t say a single word about human rights violations during his visits to India in spite of the fact that India is one of the worst violator of human rights, especially of minorities in the world.” What answer could I give, except “only truthful and just humans care about the rights of others?”

REFERENCES

¹ Since General Bhullar and others in his entourage were not known or recognized names in the overseas Sikh community, he would have faced difficulty in being accepted as a leader at the conference. The Indian Intelligence Agencies solved this problem by bringing in Saran Singh, who being an editor of The Sikh Review was very well known in the overseas community. It was Saran Singh, who facilitated the acceptance of General Bhullar as a leader of the Sikhs at the conference.

² Jagjit Singh Anad, an avowed communist is the son-in-law of the late Gurbakhash Singh Preet Lari and at one time he was the editor of Navan Jamana. Jasbir Singh Ahluwalia and Joginder Singh Puar are former vice-chancellors of Punjabi University. Jasbir Singh Ahluwalia and Joginder Singh Puar are facing criminal charges, the former for sexually assaulting a female student and the other for financial irregularities. The late Tara Singh Hayer, owner and editor of Indo Canadian Times gave an award to Joginder Singh Puar when he visited Canada.

³ Jaijee, I. S., Politics of Genocide: Punjab 1984-1998. Ajanta Publications, 1998, p 222.

⁴ Editorial. The Sikh Review, September 1995.

⁵ Gurdial Singh: Human Rights – The Flip Side, The Sikh Review, January 2002, p 73. Human Rights Debate, The Sikh Review, February 2002, p 82-83. For the benefit of the readers an excerpt from these letters is quoted here:

“The Gills and Sandhus’ of Punjab police should be honored by Punjab and the nation for saving the state from ‘talbanization’. KPS Gill is an outstanding person, learned, sensitive and committed to the unity of India. Spare a thought also for the gallant Sandhu, who fought the terrorists in Gurdaspur area. He was pursued so mercilessly by the so-called human rights activists that he committed suicide by throwing himself on the rail track of an on-coming train.”

It is interesting that whereas Saran Singh was very quick to comment on my articles in the Sikh Bulletin and Spokesman to plead his innocence, he is silent about Sangat Singh’s commentary about him.

⁶ Letter-to-Editor by Sangat Singh, Spokesman, November 2002.

Abstract: There is no support in Aad Guru Granth Sahib (AGGS) for Gurnam Singh Mukatsar’s assertion “I have noted hundreds of Shabads in the Guru Granth Sahib written by Gurus – Nanak Dev, Amar Das, Ram Das and Arjan Dev -- wherein the Gurus have made it very clear again and again that the untouchable Bhagats -- Namdev, Kabir, Rvidas and Sain -- were their spiritual leaders and true Gurus in the image of God.”

In his article on page 39 of Sikh Virsa of September 2002, Gurnam Singh Mukatsar has asserted “ I have noted hundreds of shabads in the Guru Granth Sahib written by Gurus – Nanak Dev, Amar Das, Ram Das and Arjan Dev -- wherein the Gurus have made it very clear again and again that the untouchable Bhagats -- Namdev, Kabir, Rvidas and Sain -- were their spiritual leaders and true Gurus in the image of God.”

As far as I know, there is no support in Aad Guru Granth Sahib for what he has stated. It is his imagination or misunderstanding of shabads, which has led him to make this statement. If there were shabads like ones he says, surely, scholars like W. H. McLeod and others would have pointed them out. I urge Gurnam Singh to provide a single shabad or even a single verse from AGGS, which supports his erroneous and malicious assertion.

No idea or philosophy develops in vacuum, they are built on existing ideas and philosophies. This is how human society has progressed from the very primitive to the modern age. So the inclusion of Bhagat-Bani in AGGS is not an unusual or unexpected thing. Moreover, AGGS is unique among the religious scriptures in the word – unlike the founders of other religions, the Sikh Gurus themselves wrote down the “ Divine revelation” in the form of sacred hymns. I am awe-struck at the similarity of the layout of the contents of my Ph.D. thesis, published in 1967 and that of Aad (Adi) Granth¹ compiled in 1604 by Guru Arjan Dev, the fifth successor to the house of Guru Nanak. In my thesis the titles is followed by the summary of research results, background material or prior art – reference to research related to my thesis that was done earlier, and the discussion of experimental results, in that order.

In AGGS the opening verse commonly called Mool Mantar or Manglacharan, erroneously -- is the credal statement – foundation of Nankian philosophy, followed by Japu -- the summary of Nankian philosophy. The remaining Gurbani is the discussion of Nankian philosophy whereas Bhagat-Bani is the background material. By incorporating Bhagat-Bani, Guru Arjan Dev has acknowledged the contribution of Bhagats, who preceded the Gurus and whose thoughts are compatible with the Nankian philosophy. This is the reason for the inclusion of the works of Bhagats and Sufis in AGGS. This is another unique feature of AGGS among religious scriptures.

However, only those earlier compositions were incorporated, which were consistent with the Nanakian philosophy. Wherever there were minor differences, the Gurus added their comments alongside the hymns of Bhagats and Sufis. It is well known that Guru Arjan Dev rejected the compositions of Sufi divine Shah Hussein, Bhagat Kahna and others due to their lack of consistency with the Nankian philosophy.² The compositions of Bhagats would have been distorted beyond recognition through interpolation, had they been not incorporated in the AGGS.

However, it must be pointed out that Nankian philosophy (Guru Nanak’s teachings or Sikh philosophy or Sikhi (Sikhism) is much more in scope than the thoughts of Bhagats. The Bhagats were concerned more with individual salvation than with the salvation of the society at large. For example, radical Bhagats like Kabir, Namdev and Ravidas, who opposed the caste ideology vehemently, took no steps to set up any organization to carry their message forward. Soon after their death, their followers were absorbed in the caste society.³ On the other hand, Sikh Gurus created an egalitarian society (Sikh Panth) outside the caste society and made it a springboard for giving shape to a revolutionary movement.

After rejecting the sacred thread at childhood ceremony (AGGS, p 471), Guru Nanak proclaimed his solidarity with the downtrodden at the very beginning of his ministry. “ I will stand by the lowest of the lowest caste rather with the elite -- high castes (AGGS, p 15).” Two centuries later, people who had been dehumanized by the tyranny of caste system and the oppression of Muslim rulers and whose mere shadow could pollute the Brahmans -- rallied under the banner of Guru Gobind Singh as a “brotherhood” of the noble Khalsa Order to challenge the mighty Mughal rulers before whom the Rajput warriors used to prostrate⁴ and the Brahmans used to sing paeans “Eeshvro va Dilishvro va, (The emperor of Delhi is as great as God).”⁵ They carried on the struggle of life and death against injustice and oppression for half a century. The more they were persecuted and killed the more they joined to fill the ranks of the Khalsa.⁶ With dogged determination and firm faith in the “sovereignty”⁷ bestowed upon them by the tenth Nanak, Guru Gobind Singh, they succeeded in defeating the combined tyrannical forces of “caste ideology” and mighty Mughals and establishing the Khalsa (Sikh) rule over a vast tract of Northwestern India.⁸

Who was Guru Nanak’s Guru and who was the founder of Sikhism? It is explained many times very clearly in the AGGS that God is Guru Nanak’s Guru, and Guru Nanak is the founder of Sikhism. For Guru Nanak, God is knowledge and the source of all knowledge. God made “Itself”^* manifest through “Its” creation. God’s creation is the laboratory for gathering knowledge and testing it. Guru Nanak attributed all his knowledge, understanding and experience to God. For example, what he was saying and doing was at the command of God is clearly stated in the following verses.

I was an unemployed minstrel (dhadi),
But the Master (God) gave me an occupation,
The Master called me to the abode of Truth,
And ordered me to sing the praises day and night,
And honored me with a robe of ‘propagating the glory of the True One’. (AGGS, M 1, p 150.0

Beloved people or (O, Lalo), I describe to you what the Lord reveals to me. (AGGS, M 1, p 722.)

Guru is Enlightener and Guru is Ineffable and Incomprehensible (not in totality).
One, who contemplates on such a Guru, comprehends the nature of the universe. (AGGS, M, 1, p 1125.)

Nanak met the Guru, Who is Infinite, Formless and the Almighty Lord. (AGGS, M 1, p 599.)

Nanak speaks the Word of the “Everlasting One” and he will continue doing so as this is the purpose of life. (AGGS, M1, p 723.)