SOPW Releases List of Elderly Sikhs Imprisoned Under Barbaric TADA Law

AMRITSAR, Punjab—In its efforts to keep Sikhs updated with the situations of Sikh political prisoners across Punjab and India, the Sikh Organization for Prisoner Welfare has released a list of 10 Sikhs who were indiscriminately sentenced in 2012 to 10 years imprisonment.  These Sikhs, who include 94 years old Bapu Assa Singh and  84 year old Harbhajan Singh Sarihan, were convicted under TADA, the Terrorist & Disruptive Activities Act.  SOPW states that “most of those convicted were elderly gentlemen at that stage in their lives where their health has deteriorated and their bodies are already weak. But they are forced to endure the rigours of life in an Indian jail.”

 TADA was created in 1985 to suppress the Sikh political struggle in Punjab.  The barbaric act has already been denounced by a number of countries, as well as human rights organizations.  

For a decade, TADA was used as a cover to commit mass human rights abuses, until it was eventually withdrawn due to worldwide condemnation.

SOPW further stated, “Although these aged Sikhs were convicted of handling the money stolen during the robbery in 1986, the judge actually convicted them of ‘criminal conspiracy’, thus granting them harsher punishments for the primary act of the robbery itself.”

List of Sikh elders imprisoned under TADA is as follows –

1. 94 year old Bapu Assa Singh is the only person in this case who was recently granted bail due to failing health
2. 70 year old Maan Singh has undergone a heart bypass and is in Ludhiana Central Jail
3. 76 year old Avtar Singh is serving his sentence in Kapurthala Jail
4. 72 year old Mohan Singh is confined in Kapurthala Jail
5. 84 year old Harbhajan Singh Sarihan is confined in Kapurthala Jail
6. 66 year old Saroop Singh is confined in Kapurthala Jail
7. 62 year old Balwinder Singh is confined in Kapurthala Jail
8. 73 year old Seva Singh is confined in Kapurthala Jail
9. 72 year old Gurjant Singh is in Nabha Maximum Security Jail
10. 55 year old, the youngest among this group, is in Nabha Maximum Security Jail

SOPW/Sikh Relief have been supporting these respected elders, who share one thing in common – they are panthik minded. Many have been activists for Sikh rights, even serving jail time during the Dharm Yudh Morcha in the 1980s. Now at a stage in their lives where they face health issues and complications, they are locked behind bars where medical attention is not availed to them and neither the judiciary nor the Punjab government takes any notice of their plight.

An appeal has been lodged at the Supreme Court against the decision made by the TADA court, but with the ages of these elders in mind, the appeal lays pending in the system yet to be heard and time is of the essence.