Word: akali
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...citizens. The exceptions are very, very few, and they have been misguided. The Sikhs have been a major part of India's evolvement. They have been part of India's independence struggle, and they are part of India's history. They are very much Indian. We would like the Akali Dal (the main Sikh political party) to be categorical and say it will operate within our constitution and find a way of disassociating itself from extremists...
Bhindranwale, by advocating the violent elimination of innocent Hindu civilians and of police and government officials, both Hindu and Sikh, who tried to maintain order, forged together a group of Sikh extremists composed largely of the unemployed, youths and criminals. He grasped initiative away from the collaborating Akali Dal, a political party of right-wing Sikhs. Wanted for arrest due to his directives to kill given Hindu leaders and Sikh moderates. Bhindranwale sought protection in the Golden Temple. There, he sent out directives to kill more individuals, organized military training exercises preparing the extremists for war, and converted the sacred...
...more valid criticism of Gandhi's treatment of the Sikhs would focus on her policies towards the Akali party when she regained power in 1980. During the two years following the 1977 election that voted Gandhi out of power, a coalition of the Sikh Akali party and the Hindu Janasangh party ruled the state of Punjab. When Gandhi and her Congress Party returned to rule the country, she made no effort to win over the ousted Akali politicians and incorporate them into the new government in Punjab. This left the Akalis to join forces with Bhindranwale, to become submerged...
Since 1980, nevertheless, the center had participated in negotiations with the Akali party and had in fact conceded to many of the Sikh demands that did not affect the status of the other Indian states. These include the constitutional recognition of Sikhism as a distinct religion different from Hinduism and the arrangement for broadcast rights from the Golden Temple on the All India Radio. The contentious issues, however, have been the very demands of religious, political, economic and territorial nature that involve other states and therefore dismiss the feasibility of simple bilateral bargaining between the Sikhs and the central government...
...SURPRISINGLY, the solution to these complex problems must lie beyond the Indian government alone--it must, to a great extent, rest in the hands of the Sikhs themselves. Sikh extremism has obviously continued without Bhindranwale, and the leading politicians of the Akali party are now in jail for their compliance with Bhindranwale. The moderate voice of the Sikhs must take the initiative in representing the whole of the Sikh community as the immediate bloody aftermath of Gandhi's death begins to be replaced by more normal conditions...