Operation Blue Star narrowly averted another partition

Our Club was addressed last week by Lieutenant General (Retd) K S Brar on ‘Myths and Realities about Operation Blue Star’. Introducing Lt Gen Brar, Rtn Pradeep Saxena said that his last assignment in the Army was as GOC-in-C of the Eastern Command headquartered in Kolkata. In the past 15 years, during which he stayed in Mumbai, he wrote and published a book on Operation Blue Star. He also collaborated with Frederick Forsythe in writing a particular book, which was shelved.

“Operation Blue Star is a very sensitive subject, a catastrophic event in modern India’s history,” began the veteran army officer. “It was an event that left a deep scar in this country — a sort of divide between the Hindus and the Sikhs. I will try to speak on the ingredients that went into this operation. A lot of Sikhs were hurt by it.

“As I am a Sikh myself, I am often asked why I agreed to command this operation. I said that once you wear the uniform, you swear allegiance to the country, to the defence of the country and to the sovereignty of the country. The Chief of the Army accepts lawful commands from the government if he feels it serves the national interest of the country. I shall try to put across how we were all convinced that the national interest of the country was deeply threatened.

The rot that had set in

“In the early eighties, unemployment was rampant in Punjab. Youths had no jobs as there were no industries in the State. Therefore, many misguided youths were tempted to take to violence and terrorism. Besides, there was also a lot of discontentment among the rural masses — the peasantry in Punjab.

“Simultaneously, a new demand for Khalistan arose. Surprisingly, even some of the intelligentsia subscribed to the idea of Khalistan, including rich expatriates from Canada, US and UK like Jagjit Singh Chauhan etc — who financed this movement. Money poured in and the movement grew by leaps and bounds.

“Pakistan seized the opportunity to destabilize India by creating a communal divide, by breaking up a segment of our population to serve Pakistan’s interests. It tried to convince Sikhs that they were getting a raw deal from India, and that Pakistan could offer them far more benefits. ISI took advantage of the prevailing mass unemployment and handed a lot of money, arms and ammunition to jobless discontented Sikh youths and motivated them. ISI trained them in terrorist camps in Pakistan. This was what was going on in the 80s.

“At the same time, there were party clashes and conflicts of interest between the Congress and the Akali Dal. In this game of conflicting interest in politics rose a meteoric saint — a young man with a flowing beard called Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, who was hithertofore unheard of. That man had the charisma and the flambuoyance to reach out to the masses. He went deep into the villages and preached, and coerced people to fight for the freedom of the Sikhs by carving out a separate homeland. The movement was so strong that slowly and steadily, he became all-powerful in Punjab, dwarfing existing leaders like Tohra, Longowal, Badal and other Akali leaders and assuming total command over the Sikh masses.

“A stage arrived when he moved into the Golden Temple and lived in the Guru Ramdas Niwas and Guru Nanak Niwas. Still not content with these rest rooms, he shifted his place of residence to the 1st floor of the Akal Takht, a place where never any one lived before, where holy Granth Sahib is brought from Harmandir Sahib every evening, kept for the night and taken back in procession next morning. But Bhindranwale lived there, carrying out sacrilege by walking on top of the Granth Sahib, but no one dared protest. The SGPC, the Akalis and the Sikh priests had lost their power.

“Within a few months, the temple was virtually converted into a fortress. Huge quantities of weapons and ammunitions were brought in and stocked, ostensibly for kar seva, while the police and intelligence agencies looked the other way. Lynching and murders began to take place on a large scale within the temple precincts.

“Gurdwaras in the state were sheltering criminals, who were committing sacrilege inside. There was no sanctity left in any temple. When DIG Atwal was murdered and his body thrown into the gutter, the State government did not act against the perpetrators of the crime, because it did not want to hurt Sikh sentiments. The Centre had to intervene, declaring an Emergency and placing Punjab under Governor’s Rule. The State administration as well as law and order collapsed. The police force had been infiltrated at every level.

“Bhindranwale was sitting on top of the Akal Takht, receiving audiences every day from large jaathas that came to the temple from different parts of Punjab seeking directions from him. He would ask them to commit crimes such as murders of Hindus. The misguided devotees in the jaatha would go out shouting slogans like ‘Raj karega khalsa’, court arrest and get detained in jails. The situation in 1983-84 was so bad that such people had to be released within a few days, as the jails had no place to keep them.

“On 26th January, 1984, Bhindranwale hoisted the Khalistan Flag inside the Golden Temple, but the government was silent for fear of hurting Sikh sentiments.

“The Akalis were demanding that the government should implement the Anandpur Sahib Resolutions, some of which were patently anti-national. At the instance of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, most of the resolutions were implemented, except harmful ones. She was holding intense parleys with all concerned. Unfortunately, Akalis and SGPC, who were disempowered by Bhindranwale, were unavailable for talks.

Why Operation Blue Star

“Some retired, disgruntled Generals and some dismissed from the Army joined Bhindranwale as his military advisors and planned a military strategy for defending the fortified Golden Temple against forces of the State. Bhindranwale was convinced that Mrs Indira Gandhi would never send the Army into the temple. And if she sent in policemen, they would be no match for the 2,000 armed militants inside.

“It was a gross miscalculation on Bhindranwale’s part. The last straw came on 1st June 1984 when Longowal declared an agitation against transport of grains out of Punjab. There were a lot of negotiations and behind-the-curtain parleys in attempt to bring some sense to them, but all was in vain.

“The time for a showdown had arrived. I can assure you that Mrs Indira Gandhi tried till the last day to arrive at a compromise. I dare say so because I was fully involved in everything that went on, along with late Gen Sundarji, and with Gen Vaidya who met his end at the hands of the militants some years later.

“On 2nd June, 1984, All India Radio announced that the Prime Minister was going to address the nation at 8.30 am. The time arrived and passed. The nation waited with bated breath as the radio continued to play Saare Jahan Se Achha. Finally, she appeared at 9.15 am, looking tired and sad. She appealed to the Sikh masses to give up this agitation, and join the process of peace. Her parting words were: ‘Let us join our hands for peace, not for hatred; let us shed hatred.’

“On 3rd June, the Army received orders to move into the Golden Temple. On that day, I was preparing to leave for a holiday in Manila with my wife, but in Delhi, I received a message asking me to divert to Chandigarh. My next destination was not Manila, but Amritsar. The order I received said that the entire administration in Punjab had collapsed, that there was no law and order whatsoever; the police force has been rendered ineffective; and as a last resort, Mrs Gandhi had ordered military action. But the people were our own — Indians. And we had to bear that in mind.

“At the same time, there were strong intelligence inputs that Pakistan was marching its forces on the borders. According to the KGB and our own intelligence sources, ‘Khalistan’ would be declared independent within two or three days, and Pakistan would recognize it instantaneously and move its Army into Punjab to defend the fledgling State. Had this intelligence report come true, it was difficult to imagine the disaster that would have befallen this country.

“By acting quickly and decisively, we averted a planned invasion by Pakistan and prevent the establishment of Khalistan. By keeping the police force intact, we could prevent policemen joining ranks with Bhindranwale’s men, which would have created a riotous situation akin to the one in 1947 — with Sikhs from outside rushing into Punjab and Hindus rushing out of Punjab. Had we failed, it would have been catastrophic. Not many knew what was going on then...

“Also, if Pakistani Army had entered Amritsar, I don’t think it would have been easy for the Indian Army to push them out. They would have put onto us a Bangladesh in 1984, avenging what we did to them in 1971.

The challenges

“We were told to use minimum force, and also to avoid going into the temple if possible. We appealed to the innocent devotees to come out of the temple, leaving behind Bhindranwale’s defiant hardcore terrorists, so that they would not be caught in a crossfire. We had limited intelligence as to the extent of the fortification and how many weapons were there, because the police and their intelligence had failed to provide it.

“An operation of this kind has to be meticulously planned. It was not easy. It was not like attacking enemy forces from the right and from the left, because the target was our own people, and we had to capture them by using minimum force, unharmed. It was like removing cancerous tissues from a patient’s body.

“First, we put off the electricity to cause a blackout inside; we cut off the telephone wires to stop their communication with the villagers; and then we set to evolve a plan of attack. Next day, General Sundarji presented our plan to the Prime Minister.

“We debated for a long time whether it was possible to execute a siege by encircling the temple for starving out Bhindranwale’s men. The option was ruled out because on any single day, the temple attracted 15,000 to 20,000 devotees and fed them at the free langar. So the temple always had enough reserves of food and fuel to feed that many devotees daily for 15 to 20 days. Bhindranwale’s 2000 terrorists could use these supplies to survive a seige for several months. There are wells inside the temple, ensuring ample water supply as well.

“Also, if we had laid siege on the temple, the news would have spread like wild fire to far-flung villages in Punjab, provoking tens of thousands of peasants, armed with swords and kirpans, to converge towards the temple, encircling and trapping the Army. To avoid all these possibilities, the cleaning operation had to be completed overnight, swiftly.

“We had decided to enter the temple at 9 pm. From 5 pm onwards, with loudspeakers, we began appealing to all those inside the temple to lay down arms, come out peacefully and surrender to avoid bloodshed. This happened to be the anniversary of Guru Arjandev, and so a lot of devotees had come to the temple for offering prayers. Our appeal to them largely went largely unheeded. The few elderly people who walked out told us that Bhindranwale’s terrorists were holding the devotees to ransom, including women, children, the sick and the old. We gave them more time to respond, and postponed our entry into the temple till 10 pm. Time was running out, and we couldn’t delay the action any further. We decided to go in.

“But how? Every door and window was barricaded with sandbags. The temple precinct had a huge clock tower and tall water tanks where terrorists armed with machine guns had taken position. The only open space inside the temple was the rectangular open space used for doing parikrama (circambulation) around the sarovar, the holy tank. Troops entering that place would come under fire from the surrounding structure’s rooms on the ground, first and second floors — from all directions.

“The Army men had to quickly cross two critical points — one was Harmandir Sahib at the core of the Golden Temple (which we did not want to blow up) , and the other was the Akal Takht which was the command post where Bhindranwale’s trusted military advisors like Gen Shafiq Singh (a war-decorated hero but cashiered from the Army) were entrenched. Our commandos who tried to swim across the sarovar underwater and enter the Golden Temple had to give up as they came under very heavy fire, leading to heavy casualties.

“No one knew how we would accomplish the task. Our plan to storm the temple was kept as a tight secret and people learnt it on the radio only after we entered the temple and began cleanup operation. Unless the troops were made fully aware that they were facing a national calamity, one could not expect them to perform or deliver in a disciplined manner. (By contrast, American troops were sent into Iraq little knowing what they were doing there!)

“On the morning of 5th June, I had addressed the troops to tell them that we would storm into the temple that night. I had told them what should they do inside the temple and how they should conduct themselves. One thing I had made abundantly clear to the troops at the outset was that if any of them did not want to go into the temple for any reason — religious, emotional, conscience etc — they could opt out of this operation, and their nonparticipation would not be held against them. I vouch upon my word of honour that not even one Jawan opted out in four battalions. In the fifth battallion, a Sikh officer, Second Lieutenant Jasbir Singh Raina, stood up and said that he wished to be the first to enter the temple, storm the Akal Takht and capture Bhindranwale. And we agreed to this request.

“As he entered, he came under heavy machine gun fire, both his legs were shot apart. Still, bleeding profusely, he struggled and kept crawling, saying that he wouldn’t turn back before reaching Akal Takht. We had to evacuate him forcibly and admit him to hospital, where both his legs were amputated. On 26th January, I was a very proud man when I saw him receive the Ahoka Chakra from the President of India at Rashtrapati Bhavan. The President came down the steps to pin the Ashoka Chakra on the chest of this Sikh soldier who was totally dedicated to Army.

“This is the kind of highly dedicated soldiers we have in India. At that time none of us in the Army entertained even a passing thought that we were Sikhs, so should not enter the Golden Temple.

“Anyway, the fighting went on all night. We suffered heavy casualties, and so did they. But what was important was that we finished the task that very night, and before dawn, it was all over. Bhindranwale was no more. The few terrorists left alive were frantically seeking to escape in all directions, even by diving into sarovar. In the ongoing melee and confusion, I told Gen Sundarji that either Bhindranwale had escaped or was dead, because everyone was trying to disappear from the scene. Obviously Bhindranwale was dead, because his loyalists came with a white flag and surrendered.

“And that was the end of this operation. We tried our best to use minimum force and to minimise damage to the temple property. However, it is not possible in such an operation that no scars are left behind. Some collateral damage to life and property is inevitable. Some innocent lives too were lost in the crossfire.

The post-mortem

“About 200 media persons from all over the world immediately arrived on the scene, including reporters of Manchester Guardian, New York Times, London Herald, etc. One of them asked me naively: ‘General, how could you have stormed a religious place like this?’ I countered: ‘What would you have done if St. Paul Cathedral was taken over by armed militants who barricaded the place, carried out sacrilege and committed murders there? They conceded: ‘Indeed, we would indeed expect our Government to send in troops.’ ”

“I asked a reporter which city he was from. Rome, he replied. I reminded him that during World War II, when the Allied forces were trying to advance to Rome, they could not cross the Casino river, because there was a huge monastery on the Monte Casino hill strategically overlooking the river. German soldiers had occupied the monastery, where numerous monks also lived. The Allied forces could cross the river only after they had thoroughly bombed and destroyed the monastery, wiping out both German soldiers and monks.

“What happened in the Grand Mosque in Mecca in Saudi Arabia? The holy place was taken over by armed Iranian Shia militants soon after Iran took American hostages. The Saudi Government had no other alternative but to enlist the support of mercenaries for storming the Grand Mosque. It took them seven days to do it. Such things have to be done sometimes. History is replete with such precedents and parallels. I hold that a religious centre ceases to have any sanctity when terrorists take it over and use it to commit atrocities. I told the reporters that we went into a religious place where sacrilege had been committed and we cleaned up the mess, and restored its sanctity and glory.

“However, the journalists, many of whom were blinkered, wrote what they wanted to write. They were not ready to acknowledge the realities. Mark Tully, Khushwant Singh and others rushed in to write books on the subject and be the first to hit the sales stand and the pavement. They claimed that they were voicing truth, though they weren’t there on the scene to witness what had happened. They gathered pieces of gossip from nearby pavement tea stalls and idle pedestrians and claimed their accounts to be authentic!

“After I retired, I wrote the book, Operation Blue Star, for presenting the true story to the public. It is on sale in all book shops and gone into many reprints. I received a request from a rich Canadian Sikh for translation and distribution rights in Canada and USA, but I wrote back to him saying that I had already transferred the right to publishers of the book, who brought out its translated Punjabi edition and put it on stands outside every Gurdwara in every village in Punjab. It is priced at Rs 65, within the easy reach of the peasantry who had been taken for a ride by Bhindranwale’s men. The price of Rs.145 for my paperback English book is not exorbitant either.

“The whole experience was indeed traumatic, something best avoided. I hope that we Indians will one day rise up and succeed in wiping out terrorism and crime from this country, and open our people’s eyes to the truth.

“I have been in wars with Pakistan in 1965, and again in 1971. I was among the first to move into Pakistani side of Punjab, and then to reach Dacca. But I haven’t seen anything as difficult as freeing Golden Temple from Bhindranwale.

“I must assert that Mrs Indira Gandhi till the last moment tried her very best to prevent this through secret parleys, even till a few minutes before we went into the temple.

The hit list

“God bless her soul; she met her end, Gen Vaidya met his end, and I don’t know when I will meet mine. I am high on the hit list. Three have gone, and I am surviving, despite a number of attempts on my life.

“We have a government elected by the people. It makes decisions that are best for this country, and we are the ones to execute the decisions. I hope India will not have any more such operations to carry out in future,” he concluded.

Q&A

Rtn Jimmy Pochkhanawala: How true is the talk in some quarters that Bhindranwale was Mrs Indira Gandhi’s creation who eventually went out of hand?

Lt Gen Brar: You are absolutely right. There was an ongoing political rivalry between the Congress and Akalis, and she had to prop up some powerful personages to counter the Akalis for achieving political ends. Bhindranwale was her creation, who later grew into a frankenstein. The same person who has been created to help politically had later to be demolished.

What about Saddam? Wasn’t he a creation of Americans? What about the Taliban? Aren’t they creation of Pakistanis and Americans? It is very unfortunate in military history that such instances recur again and again.