Farmers Movement Archive

Amid ‘storm’, Nihang Sikhs decide to stay put at Delhi border

NEW DELHI: From Wednesday morning, Nihang Sikhs began arriving in small groups at Singhu border to decide whether they should continue to be a part of the year-long farmers’ protest there. Many of them carried their weapons, mostly swords, and were also joined by a few women protesters. Outside the assembly venue, there were tables where the names of those who had come to attend the meeting were being listed as were their views on whether the Nihangs should stay or leave the protest site. The lynching of Lakhbir Singh for allegedly desecrating the Sikh holy book on October 15 hung heavy over the conference. He was hacked with a sword and his hand and leg chopped off before his body was tied to the police barricade. The Samyukt Kisan Morcha, the umbrella body of the farmers’ unions, had distanced itself from the gory incident and said, “We want to make it clear that both the parties to this incident, the Nihang group and the deceased person, have no relation with Samyukt Kisan Morcha.” Later, police arrested four men in the case, all of them Nihang Sikhs. The mixed reactions to the involvement of the Nihangs in the incident propelled the community to hold Wednesday’s meeting to discuss the future course of action. The discussions started around 2pm, and the first speaker, Raja Ram Singh, one of the heads of the Nihang Jathebandis, said that in other similar cases of sacrilege, the Nihangs had caught the suspects and handed them to police without ever getting justice. Gurdeep Singh Bhatinda of the United Akali Dal said sacrilege occurred regularly, forcing the Sikh community to take justice into its own hands. "In my view, this justice is correct,” he said. “We cannot tolerate sacrilege." Jagjeet Singh declared that the Nihangs should stay on at Singhu to provide security to the protesters. "People and organisations have sent letters from abroad requesting the Nihangs to stay here," he said. Sardar Gurmukh Singh from Annadata Kisan Union similarly said that the Nihangs should continue their stay at Singhu, else the farmers’ agitation would be weakened. Baljinder Kaur, an Amritsar resident who reached the protest site with another woman, Amarjeet Kaur, was emphatic about the Nihangs’ role in Singhu. “As soon as the Nihangs leave the Kundli border, the government will remove the other protesters. The Nihangs are the ones who provide security to the agitating farmers,” she said. Almost everyone wants the Nihangs to stay put at Singhu, asserted Jathedar Baba Kulwinder Singh, an important member of the Nihangs groups. "We have received the responses of people across the country and they don't want us to leave the protest site. We will hold a press conference tomorrow where we will share more details," he said. Another Nihang leader, Baba Balwinder Singh, also declared that the community was not going anywhere. "We will not leave this place. It was decided in the meeting," he said. There was another incident on October 21 when a labourer was beaten at the site allegedly by a protester angered by the man refusing to give him a chicken. Police arrested the accused, who claimed he was a Nihang Sikh.

The Times of India

2021-10-28

Delhi