BANBURY, UK—This past week, representatives of the Banbury Sikh community along with County & District Councillor and local Muslim leader, Cllr Aliyas Ahmed, met with the local MP, Sir Tony Baldry, to raise issues affecting Sikhs in India.
Local Sikh community leader Sardar Bhajan Singh accompanied with local Town & District Councillor Surinder Kaur Dhesi, and Councillor Aliyas Ahmed made representation on behalf of the Banbury Sikh community to raise issues of torture and death penalty of prisoners of conscience in India and to raise a case against controversial Indian political leader, Jagdish Tytler, alleged to be responsible for the government orchestrated mass genocide of Sikhs in Delhi 1984, coming to Britain for the 2012 Olympics despite being implicated in a legal case.
Councillor Dhesi said, “Hundreds of people in Banbury signed a national petition to abolish the death penalty in India and for prisoners of conscience to receive justice and fair treatment in India. Nearly everyone in Banbury has someone either they are related to or someone they know in their local area where they come from in India who has been harassed, tortured or been a victim of extra-judicial killings (known as ‘fake encounters’) by the Punjab Police in India.”
She added, “Sikhs living in Banbury are concerned about the poor human rights record of India, in particular for ethnic minorities living in India, and how this is being overlooked as India becomes an economic superpower. We wish everyone, irrespective of colour, religion, race or gender to be treated with dignity and fairness. Torture and the death penalty should be abolished throughout the world and Britain can play [a] leading role in accomplishing this.”
Sardar Bhajan Singh on behalf of the Sikh community would like to thank Sir Tony Baldry MP for being supportive and hearing the concerns of the Banbury community. In a letter to Councillor Dhesi, Sir Tony Baldy MP said he would raise the issues with the Home Secretary and Ministers in the Foreign Office.
Sikh24 would like to urge other Sikhs to contact their local MP and arrange a meeting in which they can highlight the death penalty and human rights abuses in India. Only last week, Channel 4 aired a documentary ‘Kashmir’s Torture Trail’ which exposed the otherwise tolerant and democratic image India had come to enjoy. Credit goes to Channel 4’s heart-wrenching (and somewhat gut-wrenching) documentary on the covert war raging in Occupied Kashmir.
Channel 4 make another documentary on Punjab violations