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The Punjab Story
6 June 1984: The Indian Army storms the Golden Temple in Amritsar. Called Operation Bluestar, the historic and unprecedented event ended the growing spectre of terrorism perpetrated by the extremist Sikh leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his followers once and for all. But it left in its wake unsolved political questions that continued to threaten Punjab???s stability for years to come. How, in a brief span of three years, did India???s dynamic frontier state become a national problem? Who was to blame: the Central Government for allowing the crisis to drift despite warnings, or the long-drawn-out Akali agitation, or the notorious gang of militants who transformed a holy shrine into a sanctuary for terrorists?
First published two months after Operation Bluestar, The Punjab Story pieces together the complex Punjab jigsaw through the eyes of some of India???s most eminent public figures and journalists. Writing with the passion and conviction of those who were involved with the drama, they present a wide-ranging perspective on the past, present and future of the Punjab tangle, and the truth of many of their conclusions having been borne out by time.
First published two months after Operation Bluestar, The Punjab Story pieces together the complex Punjab jigsaw through the eyes of some of India???s most eminent public figures and journalists. Writing with the passion and conviction of those who were involved with the drama, they present a wide-ranging perspective on the past, present and future of the Punjab tangle, and the truth of many of their conclusions having been borne out by time.
234 pages, Paperback
First published March 30, 2005
93 people are currently reading
717 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews
August 21, 2023
The Punjab Story leaves its readers completely shaken with an eye-opening first-hand account of a large-scale military operation against militants inside the Golden Temple in Amritsar, Punjab, India. Read the complete review here https://wp.me/p6rxcY-kr
June 20, 2023
Essential reading to understand the problems in Punjab leading to operation Blue Star & thereafter.
January 27, 2017
The Punjab Story is an exhaustive account of the happening in the state of Punjab in 1984. 9 people share their experiences during tbe turmoil. While journalists like Tavleen Singh, Shekhar Gupta, Sunil Sethi talk about the facts, stories and incidents while they covered the Operation Blue Star; Khushwant Singh throws light on the relations between Sikhs & Hindu while Lt. Gen. J S Aurora talks about the technical aspects & is critical of the government action.
For anyone like me who was born after the Operation, it is difficult to imagine that Punjab was simmering with communal & secessionist tensions. It's a swift read & important if we want to understand history and don't want to repeat the mistakes again. A must read!
For anyone like me who was born after the Operation, it is difficult to imagine that Punjab was simmering with communal & secessionist tensions. It's a swift read & important if we want to understand history and don't want to repeat the mistakes again. A must read!
June 20, 2015
There is hardly anything new for a reader who has already read Brar's book, Mark Tully's book on the same subject (Operation Bluestar). But for a new reader it is a good one to go through.
April 3, 2016
Finished this book. Cannot believe so much happened to what which lead to operation blue star. Must read if ur a fan of history
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 14, 2019
Collection of write ups by various people who were present and witnessed Operation Blue Star as it happened, and are telling what they knew of events leading up to it, along with the operation itself and aftermath. There is a diversity of opinions and experience here, which gives perspective, but more importantly, there are details not generally publicised then or later in the media of the nation for a long time. Those were days prior to opening up of the economic map of India, and also days prior to cable and consequent plenitude of news channels vying for more and better look at events.
This book shares a surprising little detail with another one read shortly before, about Sanjay Gandhi by Vinod Mehta - namely, both books are reissues of publications post enormous events that the people living through couldn't have been expected to know would be shadowed or at least added to or even pushed aside by events following soon thereafter. Sanjay Gandhi's death in the plane crash accident post Indira Gandhi's return to power hugely overshadowed his stature and effects stunningly, while Indira Gandhi's assassination by a Sikh bodyguard of her own with a rifle pumping some thirty bullets into the frail elderly prime minister of India forever overshadowed Operation Blue Star, making it a mere signpost to events leading up to aftermath of her assassination.
Since then it has become increasingly apparent that major role in events of this book was played by the same rogue nation in the region that is responsible for terror export not only in Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Kashmir and generally the region, but indeed in the whole world with possible exception of Arab nations, if that. That the Sikhs indoctrinated across the border seemed to forget their lost kingdom of yore had its capital in Lahore, and the most important place of pilgrimage Nankaanaa Saheb which is sort of Bethlehem of Sikhs, is also across the border, speaks much for the naivete of Sikhs.
................................
................................
05/01/2016
................................
................................
As one reads these accounts of the events leading to Operation Bluestar, so far, descriptions of Bhindrawale by various writers do invariably evoke someone very similar to one familiar with that part of history by not merely name but ideology and aims of expansion by a small insignificant person who led a violent cult movement establishing an emotional following and evoking contempt or fury in others who were revolted by the violence of the cult against rest; Bhindrawale did it against a billion Hindus, and Hitler against the whole world. Fortunately Bhindrawale was checked early, comparatively, and for this one is grateful to India, her culture and spirit. It wasn't merely a leader or a party that could do it, it was the military, and significantly, despite this military being heavily composed of the same community that Bhindrawale counted on to split the army and cause confusion and damage, playing into his hands. Instead they were far wiser, steadfast in their values and innate wisdom in crushing this manifestation in India of a disease that had caused such havoc in Europe and across the world, then barely for decades ago.
................................
................................
Quoted from Forward by "K.P.S. Gill, New Delhi, June 2004":-
................................
K.P.S. Gill is a respected officer of Indian security forces.
................................
"Indeed, if any evidence of the Khalistani fervour survives, it is among a handful of lunatic expatriates, entirely divorced from the realities of the ground in Punjab. Even this lunatic fringe has been shedding regularly, as some of its leading oddballs crawl shamefacedly back into the country to ‘rejoin the mainstream.’ Others continue to rant ineffectually in their safe havens in Pakistan, or in their adopted countries abroad, increasingly discredited among those who lent them some credence in the past."
"It is useful at this time, consequently, to remind ourselves that it was precisely this pattern of venality and neglect, combined with some of the gravest and most unprincipled political misadventures by the leadership of that time – both at the state and national level – that had given rise to the terror towards the end of the 1970s. For many, it is still a matter of complete amazement that Punjab, with its booming economy and a people so generous and open-hearted, could have been seduced by the narrow-minded and mean-spirited ideology of communal ghettoization that went by the name of ‘Khalistan.’ But those who have closely studied the dynamic of the emergence and consolidation of the terror in the early 1980s will understand that a comparable failure of political imagination, in combination with a sustained pattern of administrative incompetence and cynical manipulation, can bring about future disasters as well."
"The redundancy of Operation Bluestar was, in any event, demonstrated in 1988, when Operation Black Thunder - ...... Black Thunder and the counter-terrorism campaign that followed put the terrorists to flight by the end of 1989; but politics intervened once again, and vacillation, the failure of political imagination, and the outright incompetence of the national leadership at the highest level, again wasted the advantage that had been gained through the enormous sacrifices of the security forces. Thousands of lives were still to be lost on both sides of the battlelines before sense eventually prevailed, and the last phase of the counter-insurgency campaign brought the terrorists to their final defeat."
................................
................................
Quoted from "Genesis of the Hindu-Sikh Divide" by Khushwant Singh:-
................................
Khushwant Singh was known for his editing a magazine, apart from journalism and writing, and the fact that his father and grandfather were the builders used by British to build New Delhi, for which the father was knighted; he, the father, also used the opportunity to buy large tracts of land in the new capital, and construct the family home, apart from an apartment complex built for his descendents.
................................
"Sikhism was born out of Hinduism. All the ten Sikh gurus were Hindus till they became Sikhs. The Granth Sahib which Sikhs regard as the ‘Living Light’ of their gurus can be described as the essence of Vedanta. Nevertheless like other reformist movements Sikhism broke away from its parent Hindu body and evolved its own distinct rites of worship and ritual, its own code of ethics, its separate traditions which cumulatively gave it a distinct religious personality"
" .... they continued to be regarded as the militant arm of Hinduism. This was reaffirmed in the martyrdom of ninth guru, Tegh Bahadur, known popularly as Hind di chaadar – Protector of India in AD 1678. The guru had appeared before the Mughal court as a representative of the Hindus of northern India to resist forcible conversion to Islam."
Khushwant Singh's bias shows when he states:-
"Banda and several hundred of his Khalsa soldiers were captured and executed in Mehrauli, near Delhi, in March 1710. Their blood created fertile soil for the sprouting of Sikh political power.",
where he is not mentioning who was responsible for the execution, although its obvious it was the islamic regime; he's quite happy to exhibit his disparaging, and ignorance thereby, of the mainstream culture of India which is labelled Hinduism, in various remarks so far.
................
In the following, as before, he strains to enforce the separate identity that never was separate until goading of anti Indian campaign by forces attempting to exact revenge about India not allowing a total massacre and genocide of East Bengal, and Khushwant Singh attempts to enforce this separate identity which as a thought in the first place gave space to separatist and terrorist activities at all, however much due to the machinations of the terrorist factory across border that is mistakenly branded a nation but is merely a suitable military base for war against USSR as per design by Churchill and maintained by U.S. with billions of dollars of aid that simply disappeared in deep pockets of high up military echelon, but as a land or people remains the tourniqueted part of India thst suffers a loss of identity due to the separation from heartland that is India.
"The relationship between the Hindus and the Khalsa remained extremely close as long as they were confronting the Mughals, Persian and Afghan invaders. Hindu youths coming to join the Khalsa simply let their hair and beards grow, accepted pahul (baptism) without breaking their family ties, it was during this period that the custom of bringing up one son as a Sikh grew amongst many Punjabi Hindu families. When Sikhs assumed power in Punjab under Maharaja Ranjit Singh (AD 1780-1839), Punjabi Hindus had even more reason to turn to the Khalsa. The Maharaja, though a devout Sikh, would also revere Brahmins, worship in Hindu temples and bathe in the Ganga. He made killing of cows a criminal offence punishable with death. Although he rebuilt the Harmandir in Amritsar in marble and gold leaf, when it came to disposing the Koh-i-Noor diamond his first preference was to gift it to the temple at Jaganathpuri."
................
"British realized the advantages to them in keeping the Sikh identity separate from the Hindu. Assured of Sikh loyalty during the Mutiny of 1857 they rewarded Sikh princes and zamindars with grants of land and recruited Sikh soldiers in large numbers into their army provided they had taken the pahul and were orthodox Khalsa. An economic incentive was thus added to Sikh separatism."
"The British gave the Sikhs a vested interest in retaining the Khalsa identity distinct from the Hindu.
"Relations between the two communities remained cordial, even intimate, as much as matrimonial alliances between members of the same caste living in urban areas continued as before. As Muslim pressure for a separate state mounted and Hindu-Muslim riots broke out in many parts of northern India, Hindus and Sikhs once again formed a united front the same way their forefathers had done to face Muslim invaders and tyrants. When Partition of the country became a reality both Hindus and Sikhs living in the part of western Punjab which went to Pakistan left their lands, hearths and homes and emigrated to India."
"Of the five million Sikhs, the prosperous half had their lands and homes in the part that went to Pakistan. They were the worst losers in the division of the country. This had serious impact on their fortunes as well as on their psyche. The two-and-a-half million that were expelled from Pakistan had been the richest peasantry of India owning large estates in the canal colonies. They changed places with the largely landless Muslim peasantry of east Punjab and had to take whatever little land that was made available to them as Muslims evacuee property.
"Besides losing their land and properties Sikhs had to come to terms with secular India. Privileges they had enjoyed under the British rule by way of reservation of seats in legislatures and preferential treatment in the recruitment to the armed forces and civil services were abolished and they had to compete with other communities on the basis of merit.
"Sikhs who had observed the Khalsa symbols of unshaven hair and beards only for the economic advantages that accrued began to give them up. Their numbers began to dwindle."
Here Khushwant Singh brings up the question of separate piece of India, forgetting that the partition wasn't between Hindu and Muslim, it was between those Muslims that wouldn't tolerate others living alongside versus everyone else - India had at least eight major religions of the world, unless one begins to count various churches as separate and similarly distinguishes between various branches of muslims, when the number goes up to well over two dozen. To be specific, after partition India still has all those various religions and their followers, including muslims of more variety than elsewhere since Islamic nations often do not tolerate more than one, and if Sikhs did not have a separate piece of India, nor did Buddhists or any churches, or Jews or Parsis or followers of any other sects of any other religion.
But obviously all this is understood in India, until this question of a separate piece which is not indigenous but something used from across border to foment trouble in india, by the separated piece of india thst seeks to break up India completely, in an attempt to revenge it's identity as a small forgotten piece of India rather than the heir to the mughals.
................
"Sikh fundamentalist movement began to build up under the leadership of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale (1947-84). It had begun with the confrontation between orthodox Khalsa and Nirankaris in Amritsar on 13 April 1978 in which 13 lives were lost, mainly of Bhindranwale’s followers. The Nirankaris put on trial were acquitted by a judge who found that they had acted in self-defence. Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale swore vengeance. The Akalis lent their support to him. From the Akal Takht the Nirankaris were proclaimed as enemies of the Khalsa Panth. On 24 April 1980, Baba Gurbachan Singh, the Nirankari guru, was assassinated in Delhi by Bhindranwale followers. This was followed by the killings of many Nirankaris in different parts of Punjab. Nevertheless, Bhindranwale was allowed to go about freely, toured Bombay and Delhi and when arrested was let off. He became a formidable force and gathered round him groups of terrorists mainly from unemployed youths belonging to the All India Sikh Students Federation. From slaying Nirankaris, terrorists expanded their ‘hit lists’ to include Nirankari sympathizers, dissident Akalis and Congress party members. Their chief target was the Hindu-owned Jullundur based chain of papers. On 9 September 1981, Lala Jagat Narain, chief editor of Punjab Kesari, was shot dead. A year later Jagat Narain’s son, Ramesh Chander, fell to their bullets. Amongst those killed were H.S. Manchanda, president of the Delhi Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, DIG of Police A.S. Atwal, Dr V.N. Tiwari, nominated member of parliament and Gyani Pratap Singh, a retired priest. Many Hindu temples were desecrated and innocent Hindu and Sikhs killed in cold blood. It was obvious that the terrorists’ ranks had been infiltrated by Pakistani agents, smugglers, Naxalites and common dacoits. The police were rarely able to identify or arrest the culprits."
................................
................................
This book shares a surprising little detail with another one read shortly before, about Sanjay Gandhi by Vinod Mehta - namely, both books are reissues of publications post enormous events that the people living through couldn't have been expected to know would be shadowed or at least added to or even pushed aside by events following soon thereafter. Sanjay Gandhi's death in the plane crash accident post Indira Gandhi's return to power hugely overshadowed his stature and effects stunningly, while Indira Gandhi's assassination by a Sikh bodyguard of her own with a rifle pumping some thirty bullets into the frail elderly prime minister of India forever overshadowed Operation Blue Star, making it a mere signpost to events leading up to aftermath of her assassination.
Since then it has become increasingly apparent that major role in events of this book was played by the same rogue nation in the region that is responsible for terror export not only in Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Kashmir and generally the region, but indeed in the whole world with possible exception of Arab nations, if that. That the Sikhs indoctrinated across the border seemed to forget their lost kingdom of yore had its capital in Lahore, and the most important place of pilgrimage Nankaanaa Saheb which is sort of Bethlehem of Sikhs, is also across the border, speaks much for the naivete of Sikhs.
................................
................................
05/01/2016
................................
................................
As one reads these accounts of the events leading to Operation Bluestar, so far, descriptions of Bhindrawale by various writers do invariably evoke someone very similar to one familiar with that part of history by not merely name but ideology and aims of expansion by a small insignificant person who led a violent cult movement establishing an emotional following and evoking contempt or fury in others who were revolted by the violence of the cult against rest; Bhindrawale did it against a billion Hindus, and Hitler against the whole world. Fortunately Bhindrawale was checked early, comparatively, and for this one is grateful to India, her culture and spirit. It wasn't merely a leader or a party that could do it, it was the military, and significantly, despite this military being heavily composed of the same community that Bhindrawale counted on to split the army and cause confusion and damage, playing into his hands. Instead they were far wiser, steadfast in their values and innate wisdom in crushing this manifestation in India of a disease that had caused such havoc in Europe and across the world, then barely for decades ago.
................................
................................
Quoted from Forward by "K.P.S. Gill, New Delhi, June 2004":-
................................
K.P.S. Gill is a respected officer of Indian security forces.
................................
"Indeed, if any evidence of the Khalistani fervour survives, it is among a handful of lunatic expatriates, entirely divorced from the realities of the ground in Punjab. Even this lunatic fringe has been shedding regularly, as some of its leading oddballs crawl shamefacedly back into the country to ‘rejoin the mainstream.’ Others continue to rant ineffectually in their safe havens in Pakistan, or in their adopted countries abroad, increasingly discredited among those who lent them some credence in the past."
"It is useful at this time, consequently, to remind ourselves that it was precisely this pattern of venality and neglect, combined with some of the gravest and most unprincipled political misadventures by the leadership of that time – both at the state and national level – that had given rise to the terror towards the end of the 1970s. For many, it is still a matter of complete amazement that Punjab, with its booming economy and a people so generous and open-hearted, could have been seduced by the narrow-minded and mean-spirited ideology of communal ghettoization that went by the name of ‘Khalistan.’ But those who have closely studied the dynamic of the emergence and consolidation of the terror in the early 1980s will understand that a comparable failure of political imagination, in combination with a sustained pattern of administrative incompetence and cynical manipulation, can bring about future disasters as well."
"The redundancy of Operation Bluestar was, in any event, demonstrated in 1988, when Operation Black Thunder - ...... Black Thunder and the counter-terrorism campaign that followed put the terrorists to flight by the end of 1989; but politics intervened once again, and vacillation, the failure of political imagination, and the outright incompetence of the national leadership at the highest level, again wasted the advantage that had been gained through the enormous sacrifices of the security forces. Thousands of lives were still to be lost on both sides of the battlelines before sense eventually prevailed, and the last phase of the counter-insurgency campaign brought the terrorists to their final defeat."
................................
................................
Quoted from "Genesis of the Hindu-Sikh Divide" by Khushwant Singh:-
................................
Khushwant Singh was known for his editing a magazine, apart from journalism and writing, and the fact that his father and grandfather were the builders used by British to build New Delhi, for which the father was knighted; he, the father, also used the opportunity to buy large tracts of land in the new capital, and construct the family home, apart from an apartment complex built for his descendents.
................................
"Sikhism was born out of Hinduism. All the ten Sikh gurus were Hindus till they became Sikhs. The Granth Sahib which Sikhs regard as the ‘Living Light’ of their gurus can be described as the essence of Vedanta. Nevertheless like other reformist movements Sikhism broke away from its parent Hindu body and evolved its own distinct rites of worship and ritual, its own code of ethics, its separate traditions which cumulatively gave it a distinct religious personality"
" .... they continued to be regarded as the militant arm of Hinduism. This was reaffirmed in the martyrdom of ninth guru, Tegh Bahadur, known popularly as Hind di chaadar – Protector of India in AD 1678. The guru had appeared before the Mughal court as a representative of the Hindus of northern India to resist forcible conversion to Islam."
Khushwant Singh's bias shows when he states:-
"Banda and several hundred of his Khalsa soldiers were captured and executed in Mehrauli, near Delhi, in March 1710. Their blood created fertile soil for the sprouting of Sikh political power.",
where he is not mentioning who was responsible for the execution, although its obvious it was the islamic regime; he's quite happy to exhibit his disparaging, and ignorance thereby, of the mainstream culture of India which is labelled Hinduism, in various remarks so far.
................
In the following, as before, he strains to enforce the separate identity that never was separate until goading of anti Indian campaign by forces attempting to exact revenge about India not allowing a total massacre and genocide of East Bengal, and Khushwant Singh attempts to enforce this separate identity which as a thought in the first place gave space to separatist and terrorist activities at all, however much due to the machinations of the terrorist factory across border that is mistakenly branded a nation but is merely a suitable military base for war against USSR as per design by Churchill and maintained by U.S. with billions of dollars of aid that simply disappeared in deep pockets of high up military echelon, but as a land or people remains the tourniqueted part of India thst suffers a loss of identity due to the separation from heartland that is India.
"The relationship between the Hindus and the Khalsa remained extremely close as long as they were confronting the Mughals, Persian and Afghan invaders. Hindu youths coming to join the Khalsa simply let their hair and beards grow, accepted pahul (baptism) without breaking their family ties, it was during this period that the custom of bringing up one son as a Sikh grew amongst many Punjabi Hindu families. When Sikhs assumed power in Punjab under Maharaja Ranjit Singh (AD 1780-1839), Punjabi Hindus had even more reason to turn to the Khalsa. The Maharaja, though a devout Sikh, would also revere Brahmins, worship in Hindu temples and bathe in the Ganga. He made killing of cows a criminal offence punishable with death. Although he rebuilt the Harmandir in Amritsar in marble and gold leaf, when it came to disposing the Koh-i-Noor diamond his first preference was to gift it to the temple at Jaganathpuri."
................
"British realized the advantages to them in keeping the Sikh identity separate from the Hindu. Assured of Sikh loyalty during the Mutiny of 1857 they rewarded Sikh princes and zamindars with grants of land and recruited Sikh soldiers in large numbers into their army provided they had taken the pahul and were orthodox Khalsa. An economic incentive was thus added to Sikh separatism."
"The British gave the Sikhs a vested interest in retaining the Khalsa identity distinct from the Hindu.
"Relations between the two communities remained cordial, even intimate, as much as matrimonial alliances between members of the same caste living in urban areas continued as before. As Muslim pressure for a separate state mounted and Hindu-Muslim riots broke out in many parts of northern India, Hindus and Sikhs once again formed a united front the same way their forefathers had done to face Muslim invaders and tyrants. When Partition of the country became a reality both Hindus and Sikhs living in the part of western Punjab which went to Pakistan left their lands, hearths and homes and emigrated to India."
"Of the five million Sikhs, the prosperous half had their lands and homes in the part that went to Pakistan. They were the worst losers in the division of the country. This had serious impact on their fortunes as well as on their psyche. The two-and-a-half million that were expelled from Pakistan had been the richest peasantry of India owning large estates in the canal colonies. They changed places with the largely landless Muslim peasantry of east Punjab and had to take whatever little land that was made available to them as Muslims evacuee property.
"Besides losing their land and properties Sikhs had to come to terms with secular India. Privileges they had enjoyed under the British rule by way of reservation of seats in legislatures and preferential treatment in the recruitment to the armed forces and civil services were abolished and they had to compete with other communities on the basis of merit.
"Sikhs who had observed the Khalsa symbols of unshaven hair and beards only for the economic advantages that accrued began to give them up. Their numbers began to dwindle."
Here Khushwant Singh brings up the question of separate piece of India, forgetting that the partition wasn't between Hindu and Muslim, it was between those Muslims that wouldn't tolerate others living alongside versus everyone else - India had at least eight major religions of the world, unless one begins to count various churches as separate and similarly distinguishes between various branches of muslims, when the number goes up to well over two dozen. To be specific, after partition India still has all those various religions and their followers, including muslims of more variety than elsewhere since Islamic nations often do not tolerate more than one, and if Sikhs did not have a separate piece of India, nor did Buddhists or any churches, or Jews or Parsis or followers of any other sects of any other religion.
But obviously all this is understood in India, until this question of a separate piece which is not indigenous but something used from across border to foment trouble in india, by the separated piece of india thst seeks to break up India completely, in an attempt to revenge it's identity as a small forgotten piece of India rather than the heir to the mughals.
................
"Sikh fundamentalist movement began to build up under the leadership of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale (1947-84). It had begun with the confrontation between orthodox Khalsa and Nirankaris in Amritsar on 13 April 1978 in which 13 lives were lost, mainly of Bhindranwale’s followers. The Nirankaris put on trial were acquitted by a judge who found that they had acted in self-defence. Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale swore vengeance. The Akalis lent their support to him. From the Akal Takht the Nirankaris were proclaimed as enemies of the Khalsa Panth. On 24 April 1980, Baba Gurbachan Singh, the Nirankari guru, was assassinated in Delhi by Bhindranwale followers. This was followed by the killings of many Nirankaris in different parts of Punjab. Nevertheless, Bhindranwale was allowed to go about freely, toured Bombay and Delhi and when arrested was let off. He became a formidable force and gathered round him groups of terrorists mainly from unemployed youths belonging to the All India Sikh Students Federation. From slaying Nirankaris, terrorists expanded their ‘hit lists’ to include Nirankari sympathizers, dissident Akalis and Congress party members. Their chief target was the Hindu-owned Jullundur based chain of papers. On 9 September 1981, Lala Jagat Narain, chief editor of Punjab Kesari, was shot dead. A year later Jagat Narain’s son, Ramesh Chander, fell to their bullets. Amongst those killed were H.S. Manchanda, president of the Delhi Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, DIG of Police A.S. Atwal, Dr V.N. Tiwari, nominated member of parliament and Gyani Pratap Singh, a retired priest. Many Hindu temples were desecrated and innocent Hindu and Sikhs killed in cold blood. It was obvious that the terrorists’ ranks had been infiltrated by Pakistani agents, smugglers, Naxalites and common dacoits. The police were rarely able to identify or arrest the culprits."
................................
................................
September 14, 2019
Collection of write ups by various people who were present and witnessed Operation Blue Star as it happened, and are telling what they knew of events leading up to it, along with the operation itself and aftermath. There is a diversity of opinions and experience here, which gives perspective, but more importantly, there are details not generally publicised then or later in the media of the nation for a long time. Those were days prior to opening up of the economic map of India, and also days prior to cable and consequent plenitude of news channels vying for more and better look at events.
This book shares a surprising little detail with another one read shortly before, about Sanjay Gandhi by Vinod Mehta - namely, both books are reissues of publications post enormous events that the people living through couldn't have been expected to know would be shadowed or at least added to or even pushed aside by events following soon thereafter. Sanjay Gandhi's death in the plane crash accident post Indira Gandhi's return to power hugely overshadowed his stature and effects stunningly, while Indira Gandhi's assassination by a Sikh bodyguard of her own with a rifle pumping some thirty bullets into the frail elderly prime minister of India forever overshadowed Operation Blue Star, making it a mere signpost to events leading up to aftermath of her assassination.
Since then it has become increasingly apparent that major role in events of this book was played by the same rogue nation in the region that is responsible for terror export not only in Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Kashmir and generally the region, but indeed in the whole world with possible exception of Arab nations, if that. That the Sikhs indoctrinated across the border seemed to forget their lost kingdom of yore had its capital in Lahore, and the most important place of pilgrimage Nankaanaa Saheb which is sort of Bethlehem of Sikhs, is also across the border, speaks much for the naivete of Sikhs.
................................
................................
05/01/2016
................................
................................
As one reads these accounts of the events leading to Operation Bluestar, so far, descriptions of Bhindrawale by various writers do invariably evoke someone very similar to one familiar with that part of history by not merely name but ideology and aims of expansion by a small insignificant person who led a violent cult movement establishing an emotional following and evoking contempt or fury in others who were revolted by the violence of the cult against rest; Bhindrawale did it against a billion Hindus, and Hitler against the whole world. Fortunately Bhindrawale was checked early, comparatively, and for this one is grateful to India, her culture and spirit. It wasn't merely a leader or a party that could do it, it was the military, and significantly, despite this military being heavily composed of the same community that Bhindrawale counted on to split the army and cause confusion and damage, playing into his hands. Instead they were far wiser, steadfast in their values and innate wisdom in crushing this manifestation in India of a disease that had caused such havoc in Europe and across the world, then barely for decades ago.
................................
................................
Quoted from Forward by "K.P.S. Gill, New Delhi, June 2004":-
................................
K.P.S. Gill is a respected officer of Indian security forces.
................................
"Indeed, if any evidence of the Khalistani fervour survives, it is among a handful of lunatic expatriates, entirely divorced from the realities of the ground in Punjab. Even this lunatic fringe has been shedding regularly, as some of its leading oddballs crawl shamefacedly back into the country to ‘rejoin the mainstream.’ Others continue to rant ineffectually in their safe havens in Pakistan, or in their adopted countries abroad, increasingly discredited among those who lent them some credence in the past."
"It is useful at this time, consequently, to remind ourselves that it was precisely this pattern of venality and neglect, combined with some of the gravest and most unprincipled political misadventures by the leadership of that time – both at the state and national level – that had given rise to the terror towards the end of the 1970s. For many, it is still a matter of complete amazement that Punjab, with its booming economy and a people so generous and open-hearted, could have been seduced by the narrow-minded and mean-spirited ideology of communal ghettoization that went by the name of ‘Khalistan.’ But those who have closely studied the dynamic of the emergence and consolidation of the terror in the early 1980s will understand that a comparable failure of political imagination, in combination with a sustained pattern of administrative incompetence and cynical manipulation, can bring about future disasters as well."
"The redundancy of Operation Bluestar was, in any event, demonstrated in 1988, when Operation Black Thunder - ...... Black Thunder and the counter-terrorism campaign that followed put the terrorists to flight by the end of 1989; but politics intervened once again, and vacillation, the failure of political imagination, and the outright incompetence of the national leadership at the highest level, again wasted the advantage that had been gained through the enormous sacrifices of the security forces. Thousands of lives were still to be lost on both sides of the battlelines before sense eventually prevailed, and the last phase of the counter-insurgency campaign brought the terrorists to their final defeat."
................................
................................
Quoted from "Genesis of the Hindu-Sikh Divide" by Khushwant Singh:-
................................
Khushwant Singh was known for his editing a magazine, apart from journalism and writing, and the fact that his father and grandfather were the builders used by British to build New Delhi, for which the father was knighted; he, the father, also used the opportunity to buy large tracts of land in the new capital, and construct the family home, apart from an apartment complex built for his descendents.
................................
"Sikhism was born out of Hinduism. All the ten Sikh gurus were Hindus till they became Sikhs. The Granth Sahib which Sikhs regard as the ‘Living Light’ of their gurus can be described as the essence of Vedanta. Nevertheless like other reformist movements Sikhism broke away from its parent Hindu body and evolved its own distinct rites of worship and ritual, its own code of ethics, its separate traditions which cumulatively gave it a distinct religious personality"
" .... they continued to be regarded as the militant arm of Hinduism. This was reaffirmed in the martyrdom of ninth guru, Tegh Bahadur, known popularly as Hind di chaadar – Protector of India in AD 1678. The guru had appeared before the Mughal court as a representative of the Hindus of northern India to resist forcible conversion to Islam."
Khushwant Singh's bias shows when he states:-
"Banda and several hundred of his Khalsa soldiers were captured and executed in Mehrauli, near Delhi, in March 1710. Their blood created fertile soil for the sprouting of Sikh political power.",
where he is not mentioning who was responsible for the execution, although its obvious it was the islamic regime; he's quite happy to exhibit his disparaging, and ignorance thereby, of the mainstream culture of India which is labelled Hinduism, in various remarks so far.
................
In the following, as before, he strains to enforce the separate identity that never was separate until goading of anti Indian campaign by forces attempting to exact revenge about India not allowing a total massacre and genocide of East Bengal, and Khushwant Singh attempts to enforce this separate identity which as a thought in the first place gave space to separatist and terrorist activities at all, however much due to the machinations of the terrorist factory across border that is mistakenly branded a nation but is merely a suitable military base for war against USSR as per design by Churchill and maintained by U.S. with billions of dollars of aid that simply disappeared in deep pockets of high up military echelon, but as a land or people remains the tourniqueted part of India thst suffers a loss of identity due to the separation from heartland that is India.
"The relationship between the Hindus and the Khalsa remained extremely close as long as they were confronting the Mughals, Persian and Afghan invaders. Hindu youths coming to join the Khalsa simply let their hair and beards grow, accepted pahul (baptism) without breaking their family ties, it was during this period that the custom of bringing up one son as a Sikh grew amongst many Punjabi Hindu families. When Sikhs assumed power in Punjab under Maharaja Ranjit Singh (AD 1780-1839), Punjabi Hindus had even more reason to turn to the Khalsa. The Maharaja, though a devout Sikh, would also revere Brahmins, worship in Hindu temples and bathe in the Ganga. He made killing of cows a criminal offence punishable with death. Although he rebuilt the Harmandir in Amritsar in marble and gold leaf, when it came to disposing the Koh-i-Noor diamond his first preference was to gift it to the temple at Jaganathpuri."
................
"British realized the advantages to them in keeping the Sikh identity separate from the Hindu. Assured of Sikh loyalty during the Mutiny of 1857 they rewarded Sikh princes and zamindars with grants of land and recruited Sikh soldiers in large numbers into their army provided they had taken the pahul and were orthodox Khalsa. An economic incentive was thus added to Sikh separatism."
"The British gave the Sikhs a vested interest in retaining the Khalsa identity distinct from the Hindu.
"Relations between the two communities remained cordial, even intimate, as much as matrimonial alliances between members of the same caste living in urban areas continued as before. As Muslim pressure for a separate state mounted and Hindu-Muslim riots broke out in many parts of northern India, Hindus and Sikhs once again formed a united front the same way their forefathers had done to face Muslim invaders and tyrants. When Partition of the country became a reality both Hindus and Sikhs living in the part of western Punjab which went to Pakistan left their lands, hearths and homes and emigrated to India."
"Of the five million Sikhs, the prosperous half had their lands and homes in the part that went to Pakistan. They were the worst losers in the division of the country. This had serious impact on their fortunes as well as on their psyche. The two-and-a-half million that were expelled from Pakistan had been the richest peasantry of India owning large estates in the canal colonies. They changed places with the largely landless Muslim peasantry of east Punjab and had to take whatever little land that was made available to them as Muslims evacuee property.
"Besides losing their land and properties Sikhs had to come to terms with secular India. Privileges they had enjoyed under the British rule by way of reservation of seats in legislatures and preferential treatment in the recruitment to the armed forces and civil services were abolished and they had to compete with other communities on the basis of merit.
"Sikhs who had observed the Khalsa symbols of unshaven hair and beards only for the economic advantages that accrued began to give them up. Their numbers began to dwindle."
Here Khushwant Singh brings up the question of separate piece of India, forgetting that the partition wasn't between Hindu and Muslim, it was between those Muslims that wouldn't tolerate others living alongside versus everyone else - India had at least eight major religions of the world, unless one begins to count various churches as separate and similarly distinguishes between various branches of muslims, when the number goes up to well over two dozen. To be specific, after partition India still has all those various religions and their followers, including muslims of more variety than elsewhere since Islamic nations often do not tolerate more than one, and if Sikhs did not have a separate piece of India, nor did Buddhists or any churches, or Jews or Parsis or followers of any other sects of any other religion.
But obviously all this is understood in India, until this question of a separate piece which is not indigenous but something used from across border to foment trouble in india, by the separated piece of india thst seeks to break up India completely, in an attempt to revenge it's identity as a small forgotten piece of India rather than the heir to the mughals.
................
"Sikh fundamentalist movement began to build up under the leadership of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale (1947-84). It had begun with the confrontation between orthodox Khalsa and Nirankaris in Amritsar on 13 April 1978 in which 13 lives were lost, mainly of Bhindranwale’s followers. The Nirankaris put on trial were acquitted by a judge who found that they had acted in self-defence. Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale swore vengeance. The Akalis lent their support to him. From the Akal Takht the Nirankaris were proclaimed as enemies of the Khalsa Panth. On 24 April 1980, Baba Gurbachan Singh, the Nirankari guru, was assassinated in Delhi by Bhindranwale followers. This was followed by the killings of many Nirankaris in different parts of Punjab. Nevertheless, Bhindranwale was allowed to go about freely, toured Bombay and Delhi and when arrested was let off. He became a formidable force and gathered round him groups of terrorists mainly from unemployed youths belonging to the All India Sikh Students Federation. From slaying Nirankaris, terrorists expanded their ‘hit lists’ to include Nirankari sympathizers, dissident Akalis and Congress party members. Their chief target was the Hindu-owned Jullundur based chain of papers. On 9 September 1981, Lala Jagat Narain, chief editor of Punjab Kesari, was shot dead. A year later Jagat Narain’s son, Ramesh Chander, fell to their bullets. Amongst those killed were H.S. Manchanda, president of the Delhi Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, DIG of Police A.S. Atwal, Dr V.N. Tiwari, nominated member of parliament and Gyani Pratap Singh, a retired priest. Many Hindu temples were desecrated and innocent Hindu and Sikhs killed in cold blood. It was obvious that the terrorists’ ranks had been infiltrated by Pakistani agents, smugglers, Naxalites and common dacoits. The police were rarely able to identify or arrest the culprits."
................................
................................
This book shares a surprising little detail with another one read shortly before, about Sanjay Gandhi by Vinod Mehta - namely, both books are reissues of publications post enormous events that the people living through couldn't have been expected to know would be shadowed or at least added to or even pushed aside by events following soon thereafter. Sanjay Gandhi's death in the plane crash accident post Indira Gandhi's return to power hugely overshadowed his stature and effects stunningly, while Indira Gandhi's assassination by a Sikh bodyguard of her own with a rifle pumping some thirty bullets into the frail elderly prime minister of India forever overshadowed Operation Blue Star, making it a mere signpost to events leading up to aftermath of her assassination.
Since then it has become increasingly apparent that major role in events of this book was played by the same rogue nation in the region that is responsible for terror export not only in Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Kashmir and generally the region, but indeed in the whole world with possible exception of Arab nations, if that. That the Sikhs indoctrinated across the border seemed to forget their lost kingdom of yore had its capital in Lahore, and the most important place of pilgrimage Nankaanaa Saheb which is sort of Bethlehem of Sikhs, is also across the border, speaks much for the naivete of Sikhs.
................................
................................
05/01/2016
................................
................................
As one reads these accounts of the events leading to Operation Bluestar, so far, descriptions of Bhindrawale by various writers do invariably evoke someone very similar to one familiar with that part of history by not merely name but ideology and aims of expansion by a small insignificant person who led a violent cult movement establishing an emotional following and evoking contempt or fury in others who were revolted by the violence of the cult against rest; Bhindrawale did it against a billion Hindus, and Hitler against the whole world. Fortunately Bhindrawale was checked early, comparatively, and for this one is grateful to India, her culture and spirit. It wasn't merely a leader or a party that could do it, it was the military, and significantly, despite this military being heavily composed of the same community that Bhindrawale counted on to split the army and cause confusion and damage, playing into his hands. Instead they were far wiser, steadfast in their values and innate wisdom in crushing this manifestation in India of a disease that had caused such havoc in Europe and across the world, then barely for decades ago.
................................
................................
Quoted from Forward by "K.P.S. Gill, New Delhi, June 2004":-
................................
K.P.S. Gill is a respected officer of Indian security forces.
................................
"Indeed, if any evidence of the Khalistani fervour survives, it is among a handful of lunatic expatriates, entirely divorced from the realities of the ground in Punjab. Even this lunatic fringe has been shedding regularly, as some of its leading oddballs crawl shamefacedly back into the country to ‘rejoin the mainstream.’ Others continue to rant ineffectually in their safe havens in Pakistan, or in their adopted countries abroad, increasingly discredited among those who lent them some credence in the past."
"It is useful at this time, consequently, to remind ourselves that it was precisely this pattern of venality and neglect, combined with some of the gravest and most unprincipled political misadventures by the leadership of that time – both at the state and national level – that had given rise to the terror towards the end of the 1970s. For many, it is still a matter of complete amazement that Punjab, with its booming economy and a people so generous and open-hearted, could have been seduced by the narrow-minded and mean-spirited ideology of communal ghettoization that went by the name of ‘Khalistan.’ But those who have closely studied the dynamic of the emergence and consolidation of the terror in the early 1980s will understand that a comparable failure of political imagination, in combination with a sustained pattern of administrative incompetence and cynical manipulation, can bring about future disasters as well."
"The redundancy of Operation Bluestar was, in any event, demonstrated in 1988, when Operation Black Thunder - ...... Black Thunder and the counter-terrorism campaign that followed put the terrorists to flight by the end of 1989; but politics intervened once again, and vacillation, the failure of political imagination, and the outright incompetence of the national leadership at the highest level, again wasted the advantage that had been gained through the enormous sacrifices of the security forces. Thousands of lives were still to be lost on both sides of the battlelines before sense eventually prevailed, and the last phase of the counter-insurgency campaign brought the terrorists to their final defeat."
................................
................................
Quoted from "Genesis of the Hindu-Sikh Divide" by Khushwant Singh:-
................................
Khushwant Singh was known for his editing a magazine, apart from journalism and writing, and the fact that his father and grandfather were the builders used by British to build New Delhi, for which the father was knighted; he, the father, also used the opportunity to buy large tracts of land in the new capital, and construct the family home, apart from an apartment complex built for his descendents.
................................
"Sikhism was born out of Hinduism. All the ten Sikh gurus were Hindus till they became Sikhs. The Granth Sahib which Sikhs regard as the ‘Living Light’ of their gurus can be described as the essence of Vedanta. Nevertheless like other reformist movements Sikhism broke away from its parent Hindu body and evolved its own distinct rites of worship and ritual, its own code of ethics, its separate traditions which cumulatively gave it a distinct religious personality"
" .... they continued to be regarded as the militant arm of Hinduism. This was reaffirmed in the martyrdom of ninth guru, Tegh Bahadur, known popularly as Hind di chaadar – Protector of India in AD 1678. The guru had appeared before the Mughal court as a representative of the Hindus of northern India to resist forcible conversion to Islam."
Khushwant Singh's bias shows when he states:-
"Banda and several hundred of his Khalsa soldiers were captured and executed in Mehrauli, near Delhi, in March 1710. Their blood created fertile soil for the sprouting of Sikh political power.",
where he is not mentioning who was responsible for the execution, although its obvious it was the islamic regime; he's quite happy to exhibit his disparaging, and ignorance thereby, of the mainstream culture of India which is labelled Hinduism, in various remarks so far.
................
In the following, as before, he strains to enforce the separate identity that never was separate until goading of anti Indian campaign by forces attempting to exact revenge about India not allowing a total massacre and genocide of East Bengal, and Khushwant Singh attempts to enforce this separate identity which as a thought in the first place gave space to separatist and terrorist activities at all, however much due to the machinations of the terrorist factory across border that is mistakenly branded a nation but is merely a suitable military base for war against USSR as per design by Churchill and maintained by U.S. with billions of dollars of aid that simply disappeared in deep pockets of high up military echelon, but as a land or people remains the tourniqueted part of India thst suffers a loss of identity due to the separation from heartland that is India.
"The relationship between the Hindus and the Khalsa remained extremely close as long as they were confronting the Mughals, Persian and Afghan invaders. Hindu youths coming to join the Khalsa simply let their hair and beards grow, accepted pahul (baptism) without breaking their family ties, it was during this period that the custom of bringing up one son as a Sikh grew amongst many Punjabi Hindu families. When Sikhs assumed power in Punjab under Maharaja Ranjit Singh (AD 1780-1839), Punjabi Hindus had even more reason to turn to the Khalsa. The Maharaja, though a devout Sikh, would also revere Brahmins, worship in Hindu temples and bathe in the Ganga. He made killing of cows a criminal offence punishable with death. Although he rebuilt the Harmandir in Amritsar in marble and gold leaf, when it came to disposing the Koh-i-Noor diamond his first preference was to gift it to the temple at Jaganathpuri."
................
"British realized the advantages to them in keeping the Sikh identity separate from the Hindu. Assured of Sikh loyalty during the Mutiny of 1857 they rewarded Sikh princes and zamindars with grants of land and recruited Sikh soldiers in large numbers into their army provided they had taken the pahul and were orthodox Khalsa. An economic incentive was thus added to Sikh separatism."
"The British gave the Sikhs a vested interest in retaining the Khalsa identity distinct from the Hindu.
"Relations between the two communities remained cordial, even intimate, as much as matrimonial alliances between members of the same caste living in urban areas continued as before. As Muslim pressure for a separate state mounted and Hindu-Muslim riots broke out in many parts of northern India, Hindus and Sikhs once again formed a united front the same way their forefathers had done to face Muslim invaders and tyrants. When Partition of the country became a reality both Hindus and Sikhs living in the part of western Punjab which went to Pakistan left their lands, hearths and homes and emigrated to India."
"Of the five million Sikhs, the prosperous half had their lands and homes in the part that went to Pakistan. They were the worst losers in the division of the country. This had serious impact on their fortunes as well as on their psyche. The two-and-a-half million that were expelled from Pakistan had been the richest peasantry of India owning large estates in the canal colonies. They changed places with the largely landless Muslim peasantry of east Punjab and had to take whatever little land that was made available to them as Muslims evacuee property.
"Besides losing their land and properties Sikhs had to come to terms with secular India. Privileges they had enjoyed under the British rule by way of reservation of seats in legislatures and preferential treatment in the recruitment to the armed forces and civil services were abolished and they had to compete with other communities on the basis of merit.
"Sikhs who had observed the Khalsa symbols of unshaven hair and beards only for the economic advantages that accrued began to give them up. Their numbers began to dwindle."
Here Khushwant Singh brings up the question of separate piece of India, forgetting that the partition wasn't between Hindu and Muslim, it was between those Muslims that wouldn't tolerate others living alongside versus everyone else - India had at least eight major religions of the world, unless one begins to count various churches as separate and similarly distinguishes between various branches of muslims, when the number goes up to well over two dozen. To be specific, after partition India still has all those various religions and their followers, including muslims of more variety than elsewhere since Islamic nations often do not tolerate more than one, and if Sikhs did not have a separate piece of India, nor did Buddhists or any churches, or Jews or Parsis or followers of any other sects of any other religion.
But obviously all this is understood in India, until this question of a separate piece which is not indigenous but something used from across border to foment trouble in india, by the separated piece of india thst seeks to break up India completely, in an attempt to revenge it's identity as a small forgotten piece of India rather than the heir to the mughals.
................
"Sikh fundamentalist movement began to build up under the leadership of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale (1947-84). It had begun with the confrontation between orthodox Khalsa and Nirankaris in Amritsar on 13 April 1978 in which 13 lives were lost, mainly of Bhindranwale’s followers. The Nirankaris put on trial were acquitted by a judge who found that they had acted in self-defence. Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale swore vengeance. The Akalis lent their support to him. From the Akal Takht the Nirankaris were proclaimed as enemies of the Khalsa Panth. On 24 April 1980, Baba Gurbachan Singh, the Nirankari guru, was assassinated in Delhi by Bhindranwale followers. This was followed by the killings of many Nirankaris in different parts of Punjab. Nevertheless, Bhindranwale was allowed to go about freely, toured Bombay and Delhi and when arrested was let off. He became a formidable force and gathered round him groups of terrorists mainly from unemployed youths belonging to the All India Sikh Students Federation. From slaying Nirankaris, terrorists expanded their ‘hit lists’ to include Nirankari sympathizers, dissident Akalis and Congress party members. Their chief target was the Hindu-owned Jullundur based chain of papers. On 9 September 1981, Lala Jagat Narain, chief editor of Punjab Kesari, was shot dead. A year later Jagat Narain’s son, Ramesh Chander, fell to their bullets. Amongst those killed were H.S. Manchanda, president of the Delhi Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, DIG of Police A.S. Atwal, Dr V.N. Tiwari, nominated member of parliament and Gyani Pratap Singh, a retired priest. Many Hindu temples were desecrated and innocent Hindu and Sikhs killed in cold blood. It was obvious that the terrorists’ ranks had been infiltrated by Pakistani agents, smugglers, Naxalites and common dacoits. The police were rarely able to identify or arrest the culprits."
................................
................................
October 18, 2025
This book is an amalgamation of 8 essays written by prestigious luminaries from there separate fields on a single topic, 1984 and punjab. The militancy and rise of extremism in punjab from 1980s is one of the worst internal security crisis faced faced by the country. The authenticity of this book comes from the fact that it was written right after operation bluestar, this fact makes the book ripe with on ground facts and situation analysis. Operation bluestar will always have different connotations for different sets of people for the government it was successful attempt at flushing the golden temple free of terrorists, for the Sikhs it was a grave attack on the most important shrine- Harmandir shahib. Even though the government achieved its objective but what operation bluestar did was create a feeling of alienation among the second biggest religious minority in india. This book decodes every aspect of not only what happened in June 84 but what led to the dreaded operation and also what are it's repercussions.
October 17, 2024
An odd read - written after Blue Star in June 1984 and before the Delhi Pogroms of October 1984 - the book is a series of rank and file Congress-I literati throwing jabs at the religious leadership of Punjab in the early 80s. The esteemed writers of the book’s various essays make a number of predictions about Punjab’s future, but none get even close to guessing how bad things would get in the bloody decade following publication. General Arora’s essay was, perhaps, the only one that grapples with the dissonance between state media and state action, and was much appreciated in this somewhat repetitive anthology.
September 29, 2024
Wonderful Book!!!! It tried to cover all aspects of Punjab's trouble in 80's.
There are common thread in all religion or religious oriented issues.
When people loose faith in government due to failure on part of government or any reason they tend to alienate.
One always tend to feel as if one community or their own community is unique and do not indulge in some specific kid of activities.
But ,we men are all same and everywhere whichever the coat we were of whichever language, religion, or country.......
Very nice Book to read and take up the lessons for future course.....
There are common thread in all religion or religious oriented issues.
When people loose faith in government due to failure on part of government or any reason they tend to alienate.
One always tend to feel as if one community or their own community is unique and do not indulge in some specific kid of activities.
But ,we men are all same and everywhere whichever the coat we were of whichever language, religion, or country.......
Very nice Book to read and take up the lessons for future course.....
April 18, 2023
Multiple perspectives to one of the most conflicted military operations in India. The coverage by MV Kamath on the incident and his attempt at understanding the reasons behind it was one of the best pieces of journalism i have ever read. Completely objective in his views, he sheds light on issues that may be pertinent not just in the governance of the state of Punjab but also the rest of the country.
August 18, 2025
The narration in this book is not linear. It is a recollection of events that happend in punjab and culminated in Op Bluestar. It has viewpoint from across the spectrum and events as it happened. Although some chapter were a bit polemical and rhetorical than actual narration (MP Amarjit kaur one) But still the very best book out there on Punjab on and before 1984.
June 4, 2017
it is one of the best book about operation blue star those days were very dark for Panjab now there is peace and calm in Panjab it is a very fascinating and interesting book I highly recommend this to anyone who are interesting panjab' dark history
February 18, 2021
Not without bias by respective authors for the various reports they have written. But a good intro to youngsters who wants to know more about the Khalistani movement, its roots, how it became messy & off course the incompetence of the political personalities at that time.
November 13, 2024
A fair perspective of the genesis, failures on part of stakeholders, the spiraling effects of mismanagement, the army action, It's necessity, the tactics, the strategy of the government, the after effects etc all from people of intellect and deeper understanding of Punjab. A must read.
February 25, 2019
Gives an account of the Operation Bluestar from various perspectives, trying to include all - armymen, journalists, accounts from Hindus and Sikhs. Very exhaustive.
May 9, 2020
This book does not support any point if view..it has the viewing from police point of view, from a journalist point of view , from an extremist point of view. The most balanced book on this topic.
February 27, 2022
This book will clear some doubts and myth
will make you think how religion can become volitile once we mix with politics
And its still happening weather its Amritsar or Ayodhya
will make you think how religion can become volitile once we mix with politics
And its still happening weather its Amritsar or Ayodhya
January 13, 2023
It’s an emotional read
July 10, 2023
Excellent compilation of writings contemporary to Operation Bluestar. What is missing is a thread that stitches these writings together.
March 20, 2025
3.5 stars
March 31, 2021
This should definitely be a companion piece to Mark Tully/Satish Jacobs Amritsar.
It's moving and details the horrors of the common people, who as it happens most of the time, were the worst affected.
There are also chapters on the events leading upto the Operation and it's aftermath. However, it achieves the key purpose of recording the miseries and pain of the innocent.
It's moving and details the horrors of the common people, who as it happens most of the time, were the worst affected.
There are also chapters on the events leading upto the Operation and it's aftermath. However, it achieves the key purpose of recording the miseries and pain of the innocent.
March 12, 2023
Amazing recount of historic events
So many learnings for today's Punjab are built in the story of what happened in 1984. Diverse views and authentic reporting. Very intriguing.
So many learnings for today's Punjab are built in the story of what happened in 1984. Diverse views and authentic reporting. Very intriguing.
February 21, 2011
""The Punjab Story" is a collection of articles from multiple people and aims to give a different perspective from the point of view of individuals who have observed and studied the events leading up to and culminating in Operation Bluestar. Must read for those interested in history and in hearing from all sides involved in the conflict.
- Foreword by KPS Gill, former Director General of Police (DGP ) Punjab
- Khushwant Singh, a prominent Indian novelist and journalist, former Member of Parliment
- Amarjit Kaur, former Member of Parliment, Congress(I), strong supporter of the government action
- Tavleen Singh, the fiery young journalist who has been covering Punjab since 1980s
- Shekhar Gupta & Subhash Kirpekar, perhaps the only two young journalists who were eyewitness to the Operation Bluestar
- Lt Gen Jagjit Singh Aurora, hero of 1971 Bangladesh war (Maj Gen Shabeg Singh, who handled the defence of Golden Temple and Maj Gen Brar, who led Operation Bluestar, served under Lt. Gen Aurora)
- M V Kamath, veteran journalist
- Sunil Sethi
- White Paper on Operation Bluestar by Government of India"
- Foreword by KPS Gill, former Director General of Police (DGP ) Punjab
- Khushwant Singh, a prominent Indian novelist and journalist, former Member of Parliment
- Amarjit Kaur, former Member of Parliment, Congress(I), strong supporter of the government action
- Tavleen Singh, the fiery young journalist who has been covering Punjab since 1980s
- Shekhar Gupta & Subhash Kirpekar, perhaps the only two young journalists who were eyewitness to the Operation Bluestar
- Lt Gen Jagjit Singh Aurora, hero of 1971 Bangladesh war (Maj Gen Shabeg Singh, who handled the defence of Golden Temple and Maj Gen Brar, who led Operation Bluestar, served under Lt. Gen Aurora)
- M V Kamath, veteran journalist
- Sunil Sethi
- White Paper on Operation Bluestar by Government of India"
January 14, 2022
Mixed bag of perspectives and experiences
What I liked about this book was that it was easy to read and exposes reader to multiple viewpoints. Some of them are quite interesting, insightful, and revealing.
The book however is trimmed nicely to fall in line with the official version and doesn't venture too far away from it.
Quite a lot of typos and spelling miatakes right till the end.
This book is good for someone who wants to understand the Khalistan phenomenon and the basic philosophy and ideology behind it.
It also helps with the understanding of the Hindu-Sikh divide and its origin.
I took away a star for bad proofreading and another one for closely toeing the official version.
What I liked about this book was that it was easy to read and exposes reader to multiple viewpoints. Some of them are quite interesting, insightful, and revealing.
The book however is trimmed nicely to fall in line with the official version and doesn't venture too far away from it.
Quite a lot of typos and spelling miatakes right till the end.
This book is good for someone who wants to understand the Khalistan phenomenon and the basic philosophy and ideology behind it.
It also helps with the understanding of the Hindu-Sikh divide and its origin.
I took away a star for bad proofreading and another one for closely toeing the official version.
November 27, 2015
I found this book to be very informative and insightful. I particularly liked the format - different reporters (Shekhar Gupta, Tavleen Singh etc.), public personalities (Amarjit Kaur, Khushwant Sigh etc.) who covered/were active in Punjab in the 80s narrate their experience, while providing their perspective, of what led to operation blue star, how it was carried out and it's impact on Punjab and India - a clear story emerges as the book progresses.
October 26, 2022
A good overview of the army raid on the Golden Temple in Amritsar.
Bhindranwale was basically an illirerate village zealot who had a following.
He arranged the murders of other Sikh leaders, extorted many businesses and used the Golden Temple as his headquarters.
Moderate Sikhs should have ousted him and his angry crew right away.
Eventually Indira Gandhi sent in the army to neutralise his ass.
She was assassinated for assaulting the temple, not for eliminating Bhindrawale.
Bhindranwale was basically an illirerate village zealot who had a following.
He arranged the murders of other Sikh leaders, extorted many businesses and used the Golden Temple as his headquarters.
Moderate Sikhs should have ousted him and his angry crew right away.
Eventually Indira Gandhi sent in the army to neutralise his ass.
She was assassinated for assaulting the temple, not for eliminating Bhindrawale.
July 18, 2021
Individually the articles are uneven in quality. When you look past the individual though, it’s a multifaceted and thought provoking look at the history of Punjab in the 1970s and 1989s. While each writer brings their unique insight, some better and clearer than others, their collective insight is sharply revealing.
July 20, 2012
The Punjab Story - good insight into rise of Bhindranwale and Operation Bluestar. It pieces together the Punjab jigsaw. The complex amalgamation of religion, politics, partition issues, extremism, terrorism and the aftermath. An eye opener.
January 29, 2014
nice one to start with but still I believe Khushwant Singh and Kuldip Nayar will come with better on the issue.Good one for a nation building process
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