Pakistani gurdwaras in ISI stranglehold
Muzaffar Hussain
Organiser
June 13, 1999
Title: Pakistani gurdwaras in ISI stranglehold
Author: Muzaffar Hussain
Publication: Organiser
Date: June 13, 1999
On his famous friendship bus ride to Lahore Prime Minister Atal Behari
Vajpayee had taken along the Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Patel Singh
Badal. Badal had broached the issue of gurdwaras in Pakistan and
suggested that the management of the gurdwaras should be entrusted to
the Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC), an apex body of
all the gurdwara management organisations. Most, of the gurdwaras
were close to the Indo-Pak border. And since those gurdwaras that had
come under Pakistani rule, had fallen into neglect, if their
management was handed over to a well-run organisation like the SOPC,
all these gurdwaras would have been well looked after, Badal argued.
He further added that this would also further strengthen Indo-Pak
relations, and enhance the trust of peoples of the two countries.
During the weeklong celebration of the tercentenary of the Khalsa
Panth there was a suggestion that Pakistan should declare the
birthplace of the founder of Sikkism, Guru Nanak Dev an autonomous
city like the Vatican, and thus cam the goodwill of the world Sikh
community and also general world opinion. But this suggestion touched
the raw nerve of the Pakistani fanatics, like the Jamaat-i-Islami.
They pressurised the Pakistani Government to resist the temptation of
accepting the proffered hand of friendship, and treat it as an act of
interference in the internal matter of Pakistan.
Now the news has come that Pakistani Government has brought All the
gurdwaras under Government control. Nawaz Sharif has stated that
Pakistan has constituted a separate committee to manage the
gurdwaras. Retired Lt Gen Javed Nasir has boon appointed chairman of
the committee. He was Director General of the Inter-Services
Intelligence (ISI), the Pakistani secret service. Nasir has gathered
servile Sikhs in this committee, who are allegedly involved in
Khalistani activities. Pakistani daily Nava-i-Waqf has published that
the former Jathedar Prof Darshan Singh Ragi had presented to kirpan to
Nawaz Sharif. The Pakistani gurdwara management organisation has no
connection with the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee in India,
the paper writes. The gurdwara at the birthplace of Guru Nanak Dev,
i.e., the Nankana Sahib, the Panja Sahib and the Dera Sahib Gurdwaras
of Lahore are under the control of the Waqf Board. The land belonging
to these gurdwaras has already been con and distributed among farmers
by the Government. A Sikh from the Frontier Province had hung some
pictures of the holy Gurus on the main gate of gurdwara. But they
were removed by the local maulanas on the plea that Pakistan begin an
Islamic country, hanging such picture was against Islam and could not
be allowed. Rai Bahadur Sardar Sujan Singh's famous Bagh-i-Sardara
boasts of a gurdwara and two mandirs, but they are controlled by the
Inter-Services Intelligence. There was a time when it had the samadhi
of Baba Sarbadhal and two gurdwaras. But how there is no trace of
these.
Before Partition the region under Pakistan had a number of gurdwaras.
The book Gurdwaras in Punjab had mentioned these. Every district
gazettee published during British period is full of information on
these gurdwaras in Punjab. But not there is not a single gurdwara in
the region around Rawalpindi. In these region too, like Karachi,
there is no place for Hindus to cremate there dead. There was eight
big crematoria near Nankana Sahib and Sheikhupura. But now not a
single one remains. Now their lands have been overgrown with large
residential colonies. Therefore when a Sikh staying abroad for a long
time returns to his old land he cannot recognise his place in the
jungle growth of modern colonies. No vestige of Sikh culture is to be
found. Therefore these places have shed all their landmarks and so
any visitor coming after fifty years is lost in the new constructions
of the place. In India places abandoned by Muslims fleeing to
Pakistan could be saved by the Waqf Board. But Pakistan had no such
arrangement and so over the time the religious be perfected and were
usurped by the local elements. During the Khalsa regime, the Sikh
kingdom, which straddled the Indo-Pak borders, had vast cultivable
plane fertile lands. The Sikh rulers had donated vast tracks of the
land to the gurdwaras. There are enough documentary records available
even today. If Pakistan Singh Badal and allows to form a
Pakistan-based Shiromani Gurdawara Parbandhak Committee or grants the
autonomous city status like the Vatican to Nankana Sahib, at least
some part of the properties of the gurdwaras could be reclaimed. If
there is no such religious body there will not be any religion left to
be managed, and then whatever gurdwaras are still saved from vandalism
will be one day destroyed by neglect. Protection of the gurdwaras in
Pakistan does not constitute preservation of the property of a
particular faith or religion. But this constitutes preservation or
conservation of Pakistan's historical-cultural heritage and such
conservation of heritage forms every state's international obligation.
The Mall Road in Lahore was some time ago predominantly a Hindu area.
But over the time the Hindus have vanished. The strangest and saddest
event concerned Harkishanlal Mehra a big jagirdar who died a Hindu but
there being no Hindu to perform the last rites, the Lahore
Municipality declared him a Muslim and buried him in a local
graveyard.
This year when the Sikh pilgrims reached Lahore they were surprised to
witness the former Director General of Inter-Services Intelligence and
present Chairman of the Pakistan Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, Javed
Nasir organising functions related to Sikhs in Lahore's Press Club and
the Raj Bhawan. Allegedly in one of the functions a Babbar Khalsa
terrorist was made to announce that if Pakistan Government assists the
terrorists in their work of forming the Khalsa State "Khalistan", the
terrorists in their turn would help Pakistan capture the Indian
territory of Kashmir.
While India was celebrating the tercentenary of the establishment of
the Khalsa Panth as a national occasion, Pakistan press was indulging
in the denigration of the honoured Guru Gobind Singh by publishing
derogatory articles. Daily, Nava-i-Waqf had transgressed all limits
of decency. It shamelessly argues that as Guru Gobind Singh had waged
a war against Aurangzeb, it was natural that in retaliation Aurangzeb
too replied in kind.
But the paper coolly and conveniently overlooked to mention who
ordered the killings of Guru Teg Bahadur and Banda Bairagi. How can
the Sikhs forget Delhi's Chandni Chowk which had been a helpless
witness to the gory and ghastly scenes enacted by the Mughal rulers
and the Sis Ganj Gurdwara in Chandni Chowk which even today shudders
with the memory of their martyrdom?
When in February Atal Behari Vajpayee want to Lahore on the historic
trans-border handshake, the Pakistani rulers were singing paeans of
Indo-Pak friendship. Our countless Communist and Leftist friends were
waxing eloquent about the genuineness of Pakistan's friendship
overture. Well, then what was such a formidable happening that forced
Pakistan to execute an about-turn? What influenced the Pakistani
rulers' into deciding, on the one hand to hand over the affairs of the
Sikh gurdwaras to the ISI-nurtured Javed Nisar and on the other hand
to flush hundreds of terrorists and camouflaged armymen into
Kargil-Drass area on the Indian side of the line of control? This
Pakistani operation has forced the Indian army to take necessary
military action to encircle the infiltrators and steadily squeeze them
out, without assuming any war-like postures to save whatever progress
has been so far achieved on the diplomatic front.
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