Everyone has the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right, they freely determine their political status and pursue their economic, social and cultural development – General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV). Do all people? Do Sikhs?

From the Turco-Mongol invasion in the 16th century to the Durrani assaults in the 17th century, and the East India Company’s annexation of Punjab in the 18th Century. The Sikhs have, since their faith’s inception in the 15th Century, almost consistently needed to repulse (political and armed) attempts of subjugation by contemporary forces. However, from the mid-20th century onwards, challenges to Sikh sovereignty have come from subcontinent-born ideologies e.g., Hindutva and the absence of potent political power within the Republic of India (ROI), instead of adventitious invaders. 

A GLANCE AT SIKHS IN THE REPUBLIC OF INDIA 

Punjab, the land of origin for Sikhs, was divided into two parts by the British Empire during twilight in India. Its western part was allocated to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and eastern to ROI. The absence of competent political representatives and Machiavellian promises from ROI proponents are often sighted as the primary reasons why Sikhs could not successfully demand an independent state, and instead joined ROI. For instance, in 1946, the then would-be first prime minister of ROI, J.L Nehru, stated ‘’the brave Sikhs of the Punjab are entitled to special consideration. I see nothing wrong in an area and a set-up in the North where in the Sikhs may also experience the glow of freedom’’. Foreshadowing the strenuous state of Sikh being in the sub-continent, this proposal was reneged upon ROI’s formation in 1947. 

3 years later when the Indian constitution came into force in 1950, the Constituent Assembly of India (the body responsible for drafting the constitution) had two Sikh representatives, namely Sardar Hukam Singh and Sardar Bhopinder Singh Mann. Both refused to sign the constitution citing article 25’s problematic inclusion of Sikhism as a sect of Hinduism and not an independent religion. Sardar Hukam Singh even stated, “The Sikhs feel utterly disappointed and frustrated. They feel that they have been discriminated against. Let it not be misunderstood that the Sikh community has agreed to this Constitution. I wish to record an emphatic protest here. My community cannot subscribe its assent to this historic document”. The constitution, however, came into force with the same definition and continues to include it. 5 years later, the problematic definition was used again to incorporate the registration and dissolution of Sikh marriages in the Hindu Marriage Act 1955, instead of forming separate personal laws for them.

Then, in the 1950-60s, when the whole of ROI was being reorganised into states on a linguistic basis. Sikhs too campaigned for Eastern Punjab to be officially recognised as the state of Punjabi speakers under the “Punjabi Suba Movement”. Recognised in its original form on a linguistic basis, Eastern Punjab would have been a large geographical state for the concentrated Sikh population; Punjabi is the Sikh faith’s focal language. Considering this would set precedent for other religious minorities to demand their own states, the incumbent government viewed this as a threat to ROI’s secular principles. Thus, thousands were arrested to suppress the campaign. Eventually, Eastern Punjab was further divided into three states, out of which only one was recognised as the state of Punjab. To date, Punjabi has not been recognised as the official language of Chandigarh (state of Punjab’s capital) and the central government has kept the administrative and legislative control of the capital under its jurisdiction; the only such state capital in the country.

In the 1970s, following the geographical reduction of their homeland, disregard for their language, lack of legislative control on their own capital, and absence of recognition as a distinct faith in the constitution, Sikhs campaigned for the Anandpur Sahib Resolution. The resolution aimed at remedying the aforementioned (and several other) political grievances within the remits of ROI’s federal structure, protecting Sikhs from discrimination across India, and promoting Sikh principles in the newly carved Sikh majority state. These demands culminated in Operation Bluestar which included the holiest Sikh shrine being invaded and demolished by the Indian army, the 1984 Sikh genocide, and arbitrary arrests and extrajudicial killings of Sikhs across the country for the following decade.

THE IDEOLOGY OF HINDUTVA

V. D. Savarkar, an admirer of Mussolini’s Italy and Nazi Germany, published an ideological pamphlet titled ‘Essentials of Hindutva’ in 1923. Under Hindutva, he divided Indians into two categories, Hindus and non-Hindus. He brushed all communities and religions originating in India into the former category, stating

“Sanatanists, Satnamis, Sikhs, Aryas, Anaryas, Marathas and Madrasis, Brahmins and Panchamas—all suffered as Hindus and triumphed as Hindus”, and debarred followers of Abrahamic religions into the latter category. Savarkar’s Hindutva is best encapsulated by the following: “Christian and Mohammedan communities, who, were but very recently Hindus and in a majority of cases had been at least in their first generation most unwilling denizens of their new fold, claim though they might have a common Fatherland, and an almost pure Hindu blood and parentage with us, cannot be recognized as Hindus; as since their adoption of the new cult they had ceased to own Hindu civilization (Sanskriti) as a whole”. 

In 1925, inspired by Hindutva and Savarkar, K.B. Hedgewar founded the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) to advance the case for Hindu nationalism. Since its inception, RSS has been banned thrice in ROI, including once for the assassination of M.K. Gandhi, and has evolved into a volunteer paramilitary organisation. 

Since 2014, the BJP, one of RSS’s political limbs, has been governing India as the central government. BJP’s incumbency has coincided with RSS’s growth across the country and India’s descent in several independent watchdog democracy indexes, and rise in human rights violations. Conspicuously, the past 8 years have not fared well for those opposing the RSS, which includes religions opposing their inclusion as Hindus in Hindutva, such as Sikhs, and those viewed as ‘non-Hindus’ in Hindutva, i.e., Muslims and Christians. 

HINDUTVA AND SIKHS

In today’s ROI, Sikhs and Hindutva find themselves in an inherent ideological conflict as the former seeks to defend its sovereignty and the latter repudiates its existence as an independent faith. 

Even before BJPs rise to power in 2014, the notion of Sikh sovereignty and individuals representing it had been villainised profusely. For instance, Sardar Jaswant Singh Khalra, a Sikh human rights lawyer from Punjab, was murdered by Indian Security forces in 1995 for uncovering extrajudicial killings of thousands of innocent Sikhs in the aftermath of Operation Bluestar by local police forces. Further, the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act 1967 and amendments (UAPA), which was criticised by UN Special Rapporteurs for its potential “to conflate human rights and civil society activities with terrorist activities”, is often engaged to arbitrarily detain Sikhs. Between 2016-19, only 2.2% of all cases registered under UAPA ended in court convictions. However, allegations of torture following detention and before release are not uncommon, raising concerns about its use as a tool to perpetuate fear psychosis amongst Sikhs.

Unsurprisingly, circumstances since the BJPs election have not improved. In the last 8 years, 300 sets of the scripture central to the Sikh faith, Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji, the printing and procurement of which entails a lengthy and regulated process, have allegedly gone missing. Further, reports of the scripture’s sacrilege have become frequent. In 2015, two Sikhs were shot dead and several others were injured by the police force in a peaceful protest demanding swift investigation of a sacrilege matter. Also, during the 2020-21 farmers' protests, which started in Punjab and saw heavy participation from Sikhs, 700 ROI citizens allegedly lost their lives. Several members of the opposition in the parliament campaigned for the BJP government to indemnify the families of those who died; the government refused to admit any dissidents had died at all.

GROUND ZERO IN THE SUB-CONTINENT 

Once a sizable minority in Afghanistan, Sikhs are now nearly extinct in the country. Those who remain in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, forming less than 1% of the country’s population, live circumventing forced conversions and targeted killings. Within ROI, Sikhs form less than 2% of the country’s population and Punjab is the only state with a Sikh majority. Punjab gets 13 out of 543 seats in the country’s lower house of parliament where laws can be formed on any matter, which renders the community politically toothless due to their dependence on other states to frame policies e.g. it took 65 years for marriages performed as per the Sikh code of conduct to be considered legitimate in ROI. 

In today’s ROI, tweets threatening Sikhs of another genocide can be uploaded nonchalantly. Hindu scholars can openly prepare and propagate their desire to enforce the “Constitution of India as a Hindu State”, but Sikhs do not have the same privilege. This leads to the fundamental question: do Sikhs have the right to self-determination? Considering that the right to self-determination is not even identified by ROI’s constitution and restricted within the context of colonisation under ROI’s international obligations. It appears they do not in ROI; at least not yet.

Will ROI stop penalising Sikhs for their audacious desire to be sovereign? The following comparisons may assist you in forming your opinion: A member of the Scottish Parliament, Nicola Sturgeon, can openly campaign for a referendum to secure her country’s independence without risking physical and mental torture at the hands of the state; a Sikh member of the Indian Parliament, Sardar Simranjit Singh Mann, cannot. The government of Catalonia can go as far as holding a referendum asking its citizens if they want it to be an independent nation; Sikhs in ROI cannot even possess literature about an independent Sikh state without risking incarceration. 

Nought is the likelihood of any influential state empathising with the Sikh struggle in memento, considering ROI offers a population of 1 billion-plus to trade with. Perhaps a power vacuum caused by internal and/or external factors may lead back to sovereign ways for the Sikhs (like World War II did for ROI). Or, for the optimistic, maybe political discourse will lead to ROI recognising the right to self-determination within its constitution to pave the way. Time will unveil the path to it. As things stand, the resilient Sikhs continue in their pursuit. 

Sartaz graduated with a First-Class LLB (Hons) degree from the University of Hertfordshire and aims to practice as a public law barrister in the future. He is currently working as a Paralegal for a class action firm and has volunteered for the following organisations in the past: Citizens Advice, Shelter UK, and the Hertfordshire Law Clinic. His commitment towards pro bono services earned him the LawWorks and Attorney General Award for the ''best contribution by an individual'' in 2020.

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