The Golden Temple’s desecration during Operation Blue Star traumatised many. Jagtar Singh recounts his experience
As the announcement by Punjab and Chandigarh governments
about the imposition of a 36-hour curfew reached newspaper offices by 8.00 pm, it was not received with any sense of disbelief. The announcement made it clear that all movement had been banned in Punjab and Chandigarh during the period under curfew and this included interior rural areas.
People sitting in offices rushed to arrange for necessary provisions. Two days earlier, very heavy firing had been exchanged between the para-military forces and militants holed up inside the Golden Temple complex. Army movement had been observed in Punjab towards the end of the third week.
It was clear to the media that some action was about to begin as Punjab had been formally handed over to the army. It turned out to be a 72-hour curfew. Operation Blue Star was on. All communication links to the state had been snapped. No information was available as to what was happening in Punjab.
It was on June 6, 1984, towards the evening that newsmen were taken to the official briefing by the Western Army Commander, Lt. General K Sundarji, at Punjab Bhavan, the first real word on Operation Blue Star. Yet it was only days later that the newsmen were airlifted to the war zone that was the Golden Temple complex.
The morning of June 15 seemed to be hotter than usual. The still hotter Indian Air Force (IAF) twin engine Dakota of World War II vintage with aluminum bucket seats parked on the tarmac of the Chandigarh airport in the technical area, added to the gloomy, apprehensive and the tense atmosphere. It took off with about a dozen odd journalists from Chandigarh, the first group from the city to fly to the `war zone’ which was none other than the holiest of the holy shrine of the Sikhs, the Darbar Sahib complex in Amritsar.
As the IAF aircraft carrying journalists landed in the defence-manned areas of Amritsar’s Raja Sansi airport, it was “greeted” by armoured combat vehicles of the army, their guns pointing. It was as if an enemy plane had intruded.
However, it was a long wait for a Punjab Roadways bus to arrive and pick up the scribes. With temperatures hovering around 45 degrees celsius, air force officials tried their best to make journalists comfortable.
It was after a two-hour long wait that a rickety Punjab Roadways bus arrived. Apparently, there was little coordination between the civil and defence authorities. The journalists were first taken to the operations room where a large map of the “battle field” Darbar Sahib complex was displayed on the wall.
After a briefing by Major General Kuldip Singh Brar, the local commander of the operation, the party proceeded to the scene of action. From the main entrance on the ghanta ghar (clock tower) side, the pockmarked Darbar Sahib reminded you of the buildings damaged in World War II. The big clock on the main entrance on that side had stopped, frozen in time, indicating the exact time action began early on June 4. Inside, the stink of human flesh was all pervading.
On the historic doors of the darshani deodi leading to the sanctum sanctorum in front of the Akal Takht, a notice proclaimed in capital letters: UNDER ARMY OCCUPATION. That is exactly what it was. Army authorities took pains to explain how the damage to the central shrine had been avoided. But by then colossal damage had been inflicted at another level - the damage to the Sikh psyche.
Haversacks of the soldiers lay piled up in the two stair cases leading to the first floor of Darbar Sahib. The historic hand written Bir of Guru Granth Sahib on the first floor was covered with a white bloodstained cloth. Placing this Bir in order was a traumatic experience, which continued to give shivers to this writer even several years later.
While coming out of sanctum sanctorum, a senior officer accompanying reporters pointed to the exact place where Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, the symbol of militancy and the main motivation for Operation Blue Star, had been shot. But that description did not match the briefing by higher authorities earlier. As soon as he realised, the official was quick to make the “correction”.
Contrary to the official claim then made that the body of Bhindranwale was recovered from the basement of the Akal Takht along with that of his associates, Maj. Gen. Shabeg Singh (retd) and Bhai Amrik Singh, he was shot in front of Jhanda Bunga as he came out from the basement. (The Jhanda Bunga is the flag post where twin flags of Darbar Sahib and the Akal Takht are installed, the flag of the Darbar Sahib being the higher one, symbolising the supremacy of the spiritual over the temporal).
The ashes of Bhindranwale, Bhai Amrik Singh and Major General Shabeg Singh were immersed along with 200 others at Kiratpur Sahib on June 14. The government, for unexplained reasons, did not reveal information at that time. Heaps of bodies were loaded in the municipal corporation’s garbage trucks and carried to the cremation ground. No effort was made to identify the bodies.
The Akal Takht, the unique symbol of sovereignty and Sikh struggle constructed by Sixth guru, Guru Hargobind, which later came to acquire the distinction of being the supreme Sikh institution for prayer and politics, was still smoldering. During the army attack, Bhindranwale and his men had been holed up in the heavily fortified basement of this building which was subjected to intense tank firing.
Abinashi Singh, PA to Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee President, Gurcharan Singh Tohra, and Akal Takht Jathedar, Giani Kirpal Singh, were trying to salvage from the debris whatever they could. The stench in the Akal Takht area was nauseating and it appeared some bodies were still lay buried there. Abinashi Singh greeted the visiting journalists with an uneasy grin. The face of Giani Kirpal Singh was grim.
After coming out from the Ghanta Ghar side, as some journalists tried to go towards the serai, the residential area in the complex, they were prevented by army men escorting them. That was still the forbidden area. The convoy was taken back straight to Raja Sansi. The water tank in the serai area with gaping holes caused by artillery fire and the two observation towers of the fortress Bunga Ramgarhia in the shrine complex, told the story of heavy fighting. Only later it came to be known that tanks had been taken right inside the complex to attack Akal Takht, the last point of resistance.
The complex stood as mute witness to the three-day war. Nearly every inch of the walls, apart from the sanctum sanctorum, had bullet marks of virtually all calibers. The Akal Takht lay in ruins.
As the announcement by Punjab and Chandigarh governments
about the imposition of a 36-hour curfew reached newspaper offices by 8.00 pm, it was not received with any sense of disbelief. The announcement made it clear that all movement had been banned in Punjab and Chandigarh during the period under curfew and this included interior rural areas.People sitting in offices rushed to arrange for necessary provisions. Two days earlier, very heavy firing had been exchanged between the para-military forces and militants holed up inside the Golden Temple complex. Army movement had been observed in Punjab towards the end of the third week.
It was clear to the media that some action was about to begin as Punjab had been formally handed over to the army. It turned out to be a 72-hour curfew. Operation Blue Star was on. All communication links to the state had been snapped. No information was available as to what was happening in Punjab.
It was on June 6, 1984, towards the evening that newsmen were taken to the official briefing by the Western Army Commander, Lt. General K Sundarji, at Punjab Bhavan, the first real word on Operation Blue Star. Yet it was only days later that the newsmen were airlifted to the war zone that was the Golden Temple complex.
The morning of June 15 seemed to be hotter than usual. The still hotter Indian Air Force (IAF) twin engine Dakota of World War II vintage with aluminum bucket seats parked on the tarmac of the Chandigarh airport in the technical area, added to the gloomy, apprehensive and the tense atmosphere. It took off with about a dozen odd journalists from Chandigarh, the first group from the city to fly to the `war zone’ which was none other than the holiest of the holy shrine of the Sikhs, the Darbar Sahib complex in Amritsar.
As the IAF aircraft carrying journalists landed in the defence-manned areas of Amritsar’s Raja Sansi airport, it was “greeted” by armoured combat vehicles of the army, their guns pointing. It was as if an enemy plane had intruded.
However, it was a long wait for a Punjab Roadways bus to arrive and pick up the scribes. With temperatures hovering around 45 degrees celsius, air force officials tried their best to make journalists comfortable.
It was after a two-hour long wait that a rickety Punjab Roadways bus arrived. Apparently, there was little coordination between the civil and defence authorities. The journalists were first taken to the operations room where a large map of the “battle field” Darbar Sahib complex was displayed on the wall.
After a briefing by Major General Kuldip Singh Brar, the local commander of the operation, the party proceeded to the scene of action. From the main entrance on the ghanta ghar (clock tower) side, the pockmarked Darbar Sahib reminded you of the buildings damaged in World War II. The big clock on the main entrance on that side had stopped, frozen in time, indicating the exact time action began early on June 4. Inside, the stink of human flesh was all pervading.
On the historic doors of the darshani deodi leading to the sanctum sanctorum in front of the Akal Takht, a notice proclaimed in capital letters: UNDER ARMY OCCUPATION. That is exactly what it was. Army authorities took pains to explain how the damage to the central shrine had been avoided. But by then colossal damage had been inflicted at another level - the damage to the Sikh psyche.
Haversacks of the soldiers lay piled up in the two stair cases leading to the first floor of Darbar Sahib. The historic hand written Bir of Guru Granth Sahib on the first floor was covered with a white bloodstained cloth. Placing this Bir in order was a traumatic experience, which continued to give shivers to this writer even several years later.
While coming out of sanctum sanctorum, a senior officer accompanying reporters pointed to the exact place where Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, the symbol of militancy and the main motivation for Operation Blue Star, had been shot. But that description did not match the briefing by higher authorities earlier. As soon as he realised, the official was quick to make the “correction”.
Contrary to the official claim then made that the body of Bhindranwale was recovered from the basement of the Akal Takht along with that of his associates, Maj. Gen. Shabeg Singh (retd) and Bhai Amrik Singh, he was shot in front of Jhanda Bunga as he came out from the basement. (The Jhanda Bunga is the flag post where twin flags of Darbar Sahib and the Akal Takht are installed, the flag of the Darbar Sahib being the higher one, symbolising the supremacy of the spiritual over the temporal).
The ashes of Bhindranwale, Bhai Amrik Singh and Major General Shabeg Singh were immersed along with 200 others at Kiratpur Sahib on June 14. The government, for unexplained reasons, did not reveal information at that time. Heaps of bodies were loaded in the municipal corporation’s garbage trucks and carried to the cremation ground. No effort was made to identify the bodies.
The Akal Takht, the unique symbol of sovereignty and Sikh struggle constructed by Sixth guru, Guru Hargobind, which later came to acquire the distinction of being the supreme Sikh institution for prayer and politics, was still smoldering. During the army attack, Bhindranwale and his men had been holed up in the heavily fortified basement of this building which was subjected to intense tank firing.
Abinashi Singh, PA to Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee President, Gurcharan Singh Tohra, and Akal Takht Jathedar, Giani Kirpal Singh, were trying to salvage from the debris whatever they could. The stench in the Akal Takht area was nauseating and it appeared some bodies were still lay buried there. Abinashi Singh greeted the visiting journalists with an uneasy grin. The face of Giani Kirpal Singh was grim.
After coming out from the Ghanta Ghar side, as some journalists tried to go towards the serai, the residential area in the complex, they were prevented by army men escorting them. That was still the forbidden area. The convoy was taken back straight to Raja Sansi. The water tank in the serai area with gaping holes caused by artillery fire and the two observation towers of the fortress Bunga Ramgarhia in the shrine complex, told the story of heavy fighting. Only later it came to be known that tanks had been taken right inside the complex to attack Akal Takht, the last point of resistance.
The complex stood as mute witness to the three-day war. Nearly every inch of the walls, apart from the sanctum sanctorum, had bullet marks of virtually all calibers. The Akal Takht lay in ruins.
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