Police swoop on Sikh leaders

Press, 30 August 1984, Page 10

Police swoop on Sikh leaders

NZPA-Reuter New Delhi Indian security forces arrested 224 people including senior religious leaders in a big swoop yesterday to head off a world convention of Sikhs, the police said. Among the arrested were top officials of a committee which administers the nation’s Sikh temples, they said. Major Singh Üboke, general secretary, Bhan Singh, secretary, and their main assistants on the Shrimoni Gurdwara Prabandhak Comittee as well as several leaders of the main Sikh political party, the Akali Dal, were detained. The police said that they

were arrested at meetings called to mobilise support for a banned world convention of the religion during the week-end.

The five high priests of the Sikh religion have announced that the convention will go ahead in spite of a Government ban imposed due to worries about law and order. The convention looms as a big test between the Government and Sikh religious leaders for control of the religion.

It was called after the Government-backed Nihang Sikh sect held a rally at which 75,000 people approved controversial repairs to the religion’s holiest

shrine, the Golden Temple, in Amritsar.

The temple was damaged during the Indian Army’s assault on Sikh extremists inside on June 6.

The five high priests and the Akali Dal demanded that the army withdraw before repairs started. Punjab’s main newspaper, the “Tribune,” reported yesterday that the police had started checking buses heading for Amritsar in an effort to stop the meeting. Bans, covered by national security regulations in force in Punjab, have also been placed on more than four people travelling together in trucks and tractor-pulled trailers.