Word: sikhs
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...normal circumstances, entering the Golden Temple at Amritsar, Punjab, the holiest of Sikh shrines, is a serene and majestic experience. Over the past few weeks, however, the temple has become a formidable fortress. Religious symbols mix with modern rifle muzzles, automatic weapons, swords and battle-axes. Even women are armed, and some children as young as five have daggers hanging from their belts. The Sikhs, a sect of 12 million that broke with Hinduism at the end of the 15th century, are known equally for being charitable hosts and aggressive warriors. Today they seem solely the latter, as they...
Resistance to Sikh militancy from Hindus in the Punjab and the neighboring state of Haryana has raised the latest violence to alarming levels. Within the past two months, at least 88 people have died and almost 250 have been wounded in frenzied clashes. In one instance, Sikh extremists threw a grenade into a Hindu religious festival in Amritsar. Three people were killed, 51 injured. The Hindus quickly became an outraged mob, charging the police and accusing them of favoring the Sikhs. Unable to contain the crowd with their long bamboo poles, police opened fire with tear gas and finally...
Located on the Pakistani border, Punjab is one of India's most strategic states. It is also the wealthiest agricultural region, supplying the nation with 80% of its wheat. Yet when it comes to industrial development, claim the Sikhs, the government consistently slights them. Sikh moderates would be appeased by an increase in state power; a small radical minority, however, is determined to fight for an entirely separate state called Khalistan. So far, more than 100,000 Sikhs, known as the Akali Dal (Action Party) "Sacrifice Squad,"' have sworn to lay down their lives in the present struggle...
Gandhi has declared that she is ready and willing to negotiate with the dissidents. But the two most powerful Sikh leaders, both hiding out within the Golden Temple, scoff at such claims. While deploring the recent terrorism, Sant Harchand Singh Longowal, 51, the moderate president of the Akali, remains convinced that the government has been increasing tension rather than soothing it. "If anyone is to blame for the terrorists' presence," he told TIME, "it is the central government." His more fanatical colleague, Militant Fundamentalist Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, 36, voices a common suspicion that Gandhi is exploiting the friction...
...violence has shattered centuries of friendship between Sikhs and Hindus, and it is spreading. Three bombs have already exploded in Delhi, and last week, in Punjab's neighboring state of Haryana, Hindu mobs began storming Sikh-owned shops. With neither side giving way, tensions seem sure to mount. In the ominous words of senior Akali Leader Prakash Singh Badal, "The central government has already taken the Punjab problem to the point of no return...