You walk into your house everyday. You see your family. You are a mother, a sister, a brother, a father, a cousin, a lover, a daughter, a son. You have your dark days and days that are light. You read stories about atrocities, slander, rapes, slaughters, bombings-everything. You may be the one reading, watching from a far. You may not be hurt. But you still are the victim.
“Hold a candle in your hand and whisper the name of more than 4,000 Sikh men and women killed in 1984”. Women were raped, beaten, taken away from their families, burned alive and most of all humiliated. Mothers clutched their children too frightened to flee the mobs of iron rods, whilst blood curdling slogans of “We shall avenge blood with blood” were cried out by the atrocious Indian Congress.
Kaurs like fifteen year old Harpreet Kaur, who was taken into custody while riding her bike in Amritsar. Bhenji was tortured in her cell, where brutality and suffering came the worse for these women. Bibi Amandeep Kaur, Bibi Gurmeet Kaur to even young girls at the age of seven-taken away from their families and killed by Indian police.
How many corpses, wrapped in bloodstained white sheets lay in the different compounds? This was our family. These were our sisters, mothers, brothers, fathers-killed and abandoned without justice.
How is this ethical? More importantly, I began to realize how much I don’t think about the immortality of 1984. I do not do anything about it. If Dashmesh Pita ji declared us lions, why do we not roar? Why do we hide? #suffering #sikhgenocide #educateyourself #ensaaf