India arrests Sikh leader on the run since last month

Indian police on Sunday arrested a separatist leader who has raised calls for an independent Sikh homeland and the secession of India’s northern Punjab state, which has a history of violent insurgency.

Amritpal Singh has been on the run since last month after drawing national attention in February, when hundreds of supporters stormed a police station in Ajnala, a town in Punjab state, with wooden batons, swords and guns to demand the release of his jailed aide. .

Punjab state police tweeted on Sunday that Singh was arrested in Moga, a city in the state.

Sikh religious leader Jasbir Singh Rodde said Singh surrendered to police after early morning prayers at a Sikh temple in Moga. The police then arrested him and took him away, he said.

Bloody rebellion in the 1980s

Police officer Sukhchain Singh Gill said police had cordoned off the local village on intelligence that Singh was in the temple. “The relentless pressure built by the police over the past 35 days has left Singh with no choice,” Gill told reporters.

He said the police did not enter the temple, suggesting that Singh was detained after he left. The officer refused to confirm whether Singh had surrendered to the police as claimed by his supporters. The officer said Singh was being flown to Dibrugarh in northeastern India where he will be held until he is brought to court to face charges.

Punjab experienced a bloody insurgency in the 1980s that led to the assassination of then Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards at her official residence in New Delhi. His killing sparked bloody riots by Hindu supporters against Sikhs in northern India.

Sikhs are a religious minority in India and say they are discriminated against by the Hindu majority. More than 3,000 people were killed by extremists during the 1980s insurgency in the prosperous farming country. The rebellion was crushed by Indian forces in 1990.

Punjab borders Kashmir and Indian-occupied Pakistan. India accuses Pakistan of supporting, training and abetting the insurgents, a charge Islamabad denies.

Police declared Singh, a 30-year-old pastor, a fugitive and accused him and his aides of creating strife in the country. The police accused them of spreading disharmony among the people, attempting to kill, assaulting police personnel and obstructing the legitimate duties of civil servants.

Almost 100 supporters were arrested

Authorities have sent thousands of paramilitary soldiers into the country and arrested nearly 100 of his supporters. Singh’s wife was barred from leaving India last week.

Little is known about Singh until he arrived in the state of Punjab in 2022 and began leading a march calling for the protection of rights for Sikhs, who make up about 1.7 percent of India’s population.

Singh claims to have taken inspiration from Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, a Sikh militant leader accused by the Indian government of leading an armed insurgency for Khalistan in the 1980s. Bhindranwale and his supporters were killed in 1984 when the Indian army stormed the Golden Temple, the Sikh religion’s holiest shrine.

Singh has styled himself after Bhindranwale, with a long, flowing beard. He also dressed like Bhindranwale.

Singh also heads Waris Punjab De, or Heirs of Punjab, an organization that is part of a larger campaign to mobilize farmers against controversial agricultural reforms pushed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government. The law sparked a year of protests that began in 2020, as farmers – mostly Sikhs from Punjab state – camped out on the outskirts of New Delhi through a harsh winter and a devastating coronavirus outbreak. The protests ended after the Modi government repealed the law in November 2021.

Waris Punjab De was founded by Deep Sidhu, an Indian actor who died in 2022 due to a traffic accident.

Singh’s speech became popular among supporters of the Khalistan movement, which is banned in India. Officials see it and its affiliated groups as a national security threat. Although the movement has waned over the years, it still has support in Punjab and beyond – including in countries like Canada, the United States and the UK, which are home to a sizable Sikh diaspora.

Last month, supporters of the movement pulled down the Indian flag at the country’s high commission in London and smashed the building’s windows in anger at the move to arrest Singh. India’s Foreign Ministry denied the incident and summoned the British Deputy High Commissioner in New Delhi to protest what it called a security breach at the Embassy in London. Supporters of the Khalistan movement also vandalized the Indian Consulate in San Francisco in the United States.