Bloody attack asserts Sikh defiance

Press, 30 September 1986, Page 8

Bloody attack asserts Sikh defiance

NZPA-Reuter Chandigarh, India Sikh extremists shot dead three Hindus in a blatant attack yesterday, the first anniversary of Punjab province’s moderate Sikh Government. Four people were wounded, including a Sikh. A senior police official said two gunmen riding a motor-cycle opened fire with automatic weapons at early-morning strollers at Basti Guza on the outskirts of the industrial city of Jullundur. Witnesses said people fled in panic as the gunmen, weapons blazing, rode through the crowded suburb.

The attack took place on the first anniversary in office of Punjab’s moderate Sikh Chief Minister, Mr Surjit Singh Barnala.

It was the first serious attack since July 25, when

14 Hindu bus passengers were killed near the town of Muktsar. That was the last attack on a large-scale target, but 24 people have been killed so far this month in isolated violence as the campaign continues for a separate Sikh State.

Mr Barnala’s Akali Dal Party was swept into office one year ago by a victory in State elections that were held two months after a peace accord was signed by the Prime Minister, Mr Rajiv Gandhi, and moderate Sikh leader, Mr Harchand Singh Longowal. Mr Longowal was assassinated by extremists on August 20, last year. Mr Barnala, who was criticised for his failure to curb the extremist campaign for an independent Sikh nation called Khalistan, launched a crackdown in late July. The offensive by Pun-

jab police backed by paramilitary troops resulted in a drop in extremist attacks, but over 500 people have died in violence this year. Mr Barnala, a former lawyer, has been under siege from within his party over the police crackdown.

His supporters were reduced to a minority in the Punjab State assembly after several rebels broke away in protest over his decision to send police into the Sikhs’ holiest shrine, the Golden Temple in Amritsar, on April 30 to root out extremist leaders who had proclaimed the creation of Khalistan.

The peace accord, which aimed at ending three years of bloodshed in the Sikh-majority Punjab, is in tatters over the collapse of a key landswap clause.