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From: murali@think.ARPA (Muralidhara Subbarao)
Newsgroups: net.nlang.india
Subject: Bajwa's report
Message-ID: <4096@think.ARPA>
Date: Fri, 24-Jan-86 20:31:25 EST
Article-I.D.: think.4096
Posted: Fri Jan 24 20:31:25 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 26-Jan-86 03:55:39 EST
References: <276@ihlpf.UUCP>
Distribution: net
Organization: Thinking Machines, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 100

> Bajwa's report looks like a made up story of the opposition. It does
> not seem to have any truth in it. 

  It is alright for Bajwa to post such reports as
"Oppression in Punjab" prepared by Citizens for Democracy.
But what is disturbing is his intentions. It appears that
his intention is to exonerate Sikhs of all their misdeeds and
heap all the blame on the Indian govt. Here is a brief
summary of his postings:

 a. In his first letter on the issue (over 900 lines) he
    accused the Indian govt. of

      i) discriminating against Sikhs
     ii) desecrating the Golden Temple
    iii) arresting and torturing innocent Sikh youths
         .
         .
         etc.

     { Many on the net countered his arguments convincingly
       but Bajwa never replied objectively to the issues
       raised; he has mostly given long and descriptive
       explanations. }

  b. Bajwa posts the memorandum of Sikhs to the UN which
     contained scathing criticisms of the Indian govt. by
     many well known public figures (politicians, journalists,..etc.)

  c. Bajwa posts a news report that appeared in a Canadian
     daily which said that "Indian govt. agents were
     responsible for the planting of bomb on the Air India
     plane" which crashed and over 300 people died.

  d. Then a report of some Indian Civil Liberties organization
     (PUCL ?) which denounced
     "communal politics of Indian Democracy" { ironically,
      to my knowledge, AKALIDAL and MUSLIM LEGUE are the only
      significant political parties which are entirely and
      openly based on communal affiliations } 
      and predicted a hopeless future for India.

  5. Now the recent report which accuses the Indian govt. of
     oppressing Sikhs.

  { I may have forgotten to mention some more of his letters }

   The main point to be noted is his SELECTIVE posting of
one sided articles. It is unreasonable to expect any of us to
conuter his points with letters which match his' in length.
Furthermore, he seems to be very resourceful; How many of
us have the necessary "connections" to secure a 100 page
document banned in India? Can we secure some document
being presented to UN? Either he is very sincere and feels
very strongly about this whole issue (so strong that he 
types in a 5600 line document) in which case I think that
he is at least partly misinformed, OR he has the support and
encouragement of his friends with a particular intention
in mind.

     As for the reports of Indian civil liberties organizations,
I think that it is concievable that these organizations have
exaggerated and dramatized incidents to gain publicity and
international recognition { what better way is there to
achieve this than to publish a report that will be banned :-) }.
I am in fact quite proud of the Indian Democracy; consider
the following:

STATE                   Basis of Party in Power

Kashmir                  Parochial

Punjab                   Communal

W. Bengal                Class ( economic class )

Assam                    Language { Assamese vs Bengali }

AP                       parochial (and linguistic)

TN                       race ( Dravidians vs Aryans )

Kerala                   Economic class

Karnataka                principles { isn't this a great example?
                                      Now you know where I come
                                      from :-)  }

Others                   National party





After looking at the above list, can anyone question the
Democratic system (and the diversity of course) in India?
Of course, everything is not perfect, but isn't it 
improving?

                                     murali.