Politics over statue kicked off in Punjab on Tuesday as the Akalis, staging protest against the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, vandalised the statue of the former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in Ludhiana. Taking serious note, the Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh ordered that action must be initiated against those involved in the act.
Capt Amarinder has directed Ludhiana district police to immediately identify the culprits responsible for the violence and take stringent action against them, as per law.
By the evening, the Ludhiana Police’s CIA staff succeeded in taking into custody one of the two youth Akali leaders, Gurdeep Singh Gosha, involved in the vandalisation of Rajiv Gandhi’s statue.
The development came days after the SAD’s senior leader and general secretary in-charge of party’s youth wing Bikram Singh Majithia demanded complete withdrawal of Gandhi family’s name on airports, social schemes and awards in the country, saying that “a name synonymous with butchering innocent Sikhs in 1984 riots does not deserve this honour”.
In the back-to-back acts of symbolism by SAD and the Congress on Tuesday, the protesting Youth Akali Dal workers in Ludhiana’s Salem Tabri blackened Rajiv Gandhi’s bust and coloured the statue’s hands red — holding him responsible for 1984 riots, while the irate Congress workers, who gathered at the spot soon after the news spread, cleaned off the bust with milk and water — indicating that the late Congress leader was innocent.
While doing the act, youth akali dal leaders — Meetpal Dugri and Gurdeep Singh Gosha—get their photographs clicked, which was later shared in the social media. They termed Rajiv Gandhi responsible for killings of Sikhs, while demanding to withdraw Bharat Ratna from the former prime minister.
Gosha said: “We don't have any fear from the law. Despite the Congress government in power, we dare to blacken Gandhi’s statue. If the police want to arrest us, we don't have any fear. It is our emotions attached with the Sikhs and their families who were killed in the past.”
He said that they would also blacken other statues in the city to express their anger against Rajiv Gandhi.
Ludhiana Congress president Gurpreet Singh Gogi said that the culprits would not be spared, case would be registered against them, and a complaint has been lodged with the police.
A Congress worker said that the act of defiling a former Prime Minister’s statue is “pathetic. The Congress workers will not let the Akalis rest and they will protest against this goondaism at all costs”.
Congress leader Gursimran Singh Mand cleaned the statue, blackened by Youth Akali Dal, with his turban.
Large number of Sikhs was killed following former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's death in 1984, and the issue was back in news again after the Congress leader Sajjan Kumar was convicted in the matter, and Kamal Nath, named in the Nanavati Commission report probing riot cases, took oath as Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister.
Although Nath doesn't face criminal charges, he was named by several eye-witnesses as being a part of the mob that killed Sikhs.
The controversy spilled over to New Delhi when the Delhi Assembly passed a resolution demanding swift justice to the victims of the massacre. An amendment in the resolution, which was not passed by the Assembly, also urged the Centre to take back the Bharat Ratna conferred posthumously on the late Prime Minister.
The Akali Dal, which is in Opposition in Punjab, also made a similar demand.