Haryana Government passes resolution to stop Punjab from de-notifying SYL-land

File Photo: Current condition of the SYL canal
File Photo: Current condition of the SYL canal

CHANDIGARH, Punjab—Terming the Punjab government’s announcement to de-notify SYL-Canal land as “unconstitutional and mischievous act”, the BJP led Haryana government passed a resolution requesting Governor Kaptan Singh Solanki’s intervention.  The resolution was passed unanimously in a meeting called by Chief Minister of Haryana Manohar Lal Khattar with support of all Political parties Haryana except Congress.

In the resolution, Haryana government has claimed that it was neither asking for charity nor demanding Punjab’s share. It further reads that SYL-Canal was just a passage of allotted waters of Ravi-Beas Rivers to Haryana.

Commenting on the boycott of the meeting by state’s Congress leadership, Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar said that the Congress was not in favour of Haryana. He alleged that Congress was playing politics over the issue. On the other hand, Congress leader Ashok Tanwar and the Congress Legislature Party leader Kiran Choudhary clarified that they didn’t participate in the meeting due to the double standards being followed by BJP over the issue.

“BJP has an alliance with Akali Dal in Punjab and in Centre, so how could they be honest towards Haryana,” said Kiran Chaudhary.

22 COMMENTS

      • A home land is not a static place .

        For Sikhs it use to Pakistan once upon a time ,then India and now Canada and USA .
        May be Mars next and then God Knows where next ?
        Life is a Journey or a Voyage and not a static place.

      • Slowly slowly it comes out from you. You don’t want the SIkhs to call what’s left of Punjab their ‘homeland’ so you can take it from them. 1947 partition of it and 1966 division is not enough, you want to claim the very soil under Darbar Sahib and Anandpur Sahib too? The Muslims are spread out all over the world too but everyone of them looks to Mecca as their spiritual homeland, the Jews are spread out but they look to Israel. No different with the monotheistic Sikhs as our faith was birthed in Punjab and its holiest places are there along with Sikh historical sites and our very Gurmukhi language not to mention the blood, sweat and tears of our kaum in Punjab’s soil. Now we know why you keep wanting ‘resurrection’ for Sikhs to emigrate out of Punjab – NEVER going to happen. NEVER make that mistake of thinking you can achieve such a dastardly ambition. And don’t think you get away with that insidious comment ‘A home land is not a static place .For Sikhs it use to Pakistan once upon a time ,then India and now Canada and USA’. Pakistan was created at the same moment as India and the Sikh homeland and the Sikh Empire and Khalsa Raj pre-dates both of them. Why don’t you move out, you love space so much, I pay for your one-way ticket to the stars.

    • You mean apart from the genocidal pogroms (still no justice after 30 years), the bleeding dry of Punjab’s waters, the sacrileges being carried out against Sri Guru Granth Sahib, the discrimination SIkhs face (Sikhs have been prevented form entering court rooms and even exam halls in Punjab because they are wearing kirpans et al), extra judicial torture and killings (with police being let off scot free) and the vindictive persecution of Sikh rights activists and even dissidents abroad? These matters need to be put right.

  1. I guess there should be a Referendum Wether

    Punjab ,Haryana ,HP and Jammu should reunite or not.

    I think it will be GOOD for all the residents of the three and a half state.

    We need to study the model of .Some body could do a Phd and an expert committee could be set up by all the three and a half states of Punjab ,Haryana ,HP and Jammu

    German Reunification
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_reunification
    EU Unification
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_of_Europe

    • How would it be good for Punjabi Sikhs? We would become electorally a minority within our own homeland and still lose our water to Haryana, HM and Rajasthan. As for incorporating Jammu as well that would just do the same to the Muslim population’s electoral… Oh, now I see what you mean… Just build the canal and desalination plant from Indian Ocean and leave the Sikhs alone.

  2. fleeing political persecution from India. :—That is how you define a Refugees.
    All refugees in world and all strife in world has its origin in the Empires imperialistic policies .

    • A-ha! So you concede that Sikhs have been fleeing persecution from India! Perhaps you would like to revise your opinion now that Sikhs like Bhai Parmjit Singh that India was trying to extradict from Portugal had indeed been the victim of persecution as he had been granted political asylum status as he was in fear of torture in India?

      • I agree Sikhs in India have faced persecution in the
        Bhindranwale _Indira Punjab–1980-1990.

        This was because Law was being broken by both sides as happens in all wars.

        All is fair in Love and War

      • No you are still in denial with the facts of the case. Sikhs were agitating for their rights since 1947 when promises (to make them throw in theior lot with India rather than become an Independent SIkh state once again) made to them were broken by the Indian Sarkar. These grievances – only made worse by Punjabi Hindus less than 9 years after independence deciding to partition Punjab again in 1966 – were summed up in the Anandpur Sahib Resolutions formulated during the 1960s into the 1970s which were rebuffed by the Indian Sarkar which instead decided to try and divide the Sikhs by supporting massacre of Sikhs in 1978 after Sikhs had been prominent in opposing illegal emergency instigated by PM Inidira Gandhi. She then responded by trying to use Bhindranwale as a proxy – totally ignorant of Sikh history that Sikhs can not be used as catspaws in that manner when it comes to their religion – to dilute Sikh political power in the PUnjab. It is not a case of law being broken by both sides as you keep insisting but bad faith from the very beginning of 1947 from the Indian Sarkar which has deliberately tried to repress Sikh identity.

      • ‘All is fair in Love and War’ is your oft repeated refrain and it is utterly wrong. That is why we have the Geneva Convention and international laws of ‘crimes against humanity’ and ‘War Crimes’ and international court in the Hague to try anyone including generals, police officers and heads of state who contravene these basic fundamental human rights. This ‘defence’ of ‘All is fair in Love and War’ was rejected by the Nuremberg trials after World War 2.

  3. The favourite pass time of all Empires are

    1) Re draw world maps like in middle east and Indian sub continent.
    2) Relocate people as refugees like Sikhs in Canada .
    3) Spread chaos
    4) Spread war both civil and external all over world.

    • Sikhs in Canada are NOT refugees! They migrated there for economic reasons and fleeing political persecution from India.

    • Division of Punjab post 1947 when India and Pakistan created occurred in 1966 with no imperial colonial power. It was Indian Hinduvta movement that instigated Punjabi Hindus to start seeing difference between themselves and their Punjabi Sikh brethren. The 1966 referendum was offered to Punjabi Hindus by Indian Government and the Punjabi Hindus voted to leave Punjab and forsake their mother tongue to create artificial state of Haryana and adopt Hindi as their language. Nothing to do with outside foreign existencial forces that you blame for everyone of India’s ills but with indigenous Indian Punjabi Hindu’s desire for self determination.

      • Blood bonds should not be broken based on denial of Language in past .
        If language was the reason why brothers broke of then we need to reunify our selves .
        There is more power in Unity than in Identity .
        Punjab ,Haryana ,HP and even Jammu must reunite to form a Big Punjab just like the Germans and EU.

        Unification is the flavor of the world today .

      • Blood bond was broken by the Punjabi Hindu (incited and spurred egged by Hinduvta politicians that continued in the Punjab during the 1970s and up to 1984) not just be their rejection of their mother tongue but also by their rejection of their brother Sikh just a mere nine years after Independence. ‘Reunifying’ after FIFTY YEARS of voluntary separation by the Hindu majority in Haryana just smacks of totally insincere opportunism (as they now understand they need Punjab’s water and Punjab is waking up to refuse them as her own fields run dry) rather than reconciliation that they were wrong.
        Also you misunderstand the concept of the union in regards to the European Union as it is not a union of federated states (as for example the US where there is at least some semblance of one language, culture and history) but a union of independent sovereign countries which have decided to cede some of their powers – not their sovereignty – to an European parliament and bureaucracy which is largely dominated and steered by Germany. The UK is particularly defiant of any notion that the EU has primacy of their government and the sovereignty of British people. The Sikhs have a lot in common with this sense of self and the need to preserve unique identity rather than have it subsumed by others who do not share the same language, culture and history. The same approach the EU has adopted towards the UK with for example Mastricht treaty needs to be employed towards the Sikhs with opt outs, exemptions and recognition that the Sikhs too are unique and distinct and that these characteristics need to be respected i.e. You leave the Sikhs to deal with their own internal affairs.

  4. Just unify Haryana and Punjab and the problem is solved.
    If Germany, Europe can do it then so can we.
    Let us show the world that we can co -exist in peace and harmony.

    • Deeply cynical plan to dilute power of Sikhs by then saying Sikhs in Punjab are no longer the majority even within their own homeland. Plus of course you create a legal technicality to get around the abuse of riparian law by saying ‘hey, look we are no longer diverting water from Punjab it is just being relocated within greater Punjab’. The Sikh homeland of Punjab would still be bereft of its water leading to further degradation of Sikh farmers lands. Also within this suddenly proposed ‘reunification’ what is going to be the language of PUnjab – is it still going to be Punjabi (which Punjabi Hindus abandoned to make Haryana in 1966) or will you make Hindi the language? Perhaps you will change the name of Punjab as well – after all by the time you are done with it won’t be land of five rivers but rather land of a couple of canals. You are not sharing water when you are diverting it away from Punjab’s farmlands rendering them useless after thousands of years to lands which do not naturally have rich farmland. The Punjab was breadbasket of India for decades and we can continue to feed the rest of India only if we keep our own resources which are essential to health and economy of our land. You think Modi would allow Gujrat to give up its precious natural resources to anyone?
      ‘European Unification’ were ideals held by Napoleon and Hitler. If you are talking about ‘ever closer political union’ that is not agreed to by everyone in Europe (The UK has just recently made it clear that they will NEVER accept this and will hold a referendum in July to ask their people whether they wish to leave the European Union which badly needs reform because it is bypassing the democratic sovereignty of member states) and you can see the strain with both the Euro (Greek bailouts which would lead to domino effect of Italy and Portugal falling out of monetary union) and the asylum seeker migration issue which has led to the closed borders and a serious suggestion that the Schengen Agreement (which abolished the EU’s internal borders other than for countries which opted out such as the UK) will have to be abandoned. In truth only one state in European union does all the big decisions and that happens to be Germany (so they got their way even without Hitler) clearly demonstrating what happens to the smaller partners in such unions and which would happen to Sikh homeland of Punjab if it were wrestled into submission by neighbouring Hindu majority States. As for killing our language well it is well known that for you to take away a people’s identity you need to get rid of the indigenous language – ask the Scots, the Welsh and Irish about what happened to their native tongues of Gaelic. There is nothing ‘extremist’ about wanting to protect your won language and I bitterly resent you stating that such an aspiration is somehow extremist as it is essential to one’s identity and in the case of Sikhs you are talking about a religious language with Gurmukhi in which Guru Granth Sahib Ji is written. No doubt you would prefer all the Saroops to be only in Hindi then you could slip ‘truth’ of ramayana into them too. Under NO circumstances are you going to divide Sikh homeland of Punjab any further or renaming it nor are you going to emasculate it by conjoining it with peoples of other States to give them a veto over Sikh affairs. As for German reunification you do know that was between East Germany and West Germany reuniting Germanic peoples? The analogue now would be to reunite Punjabis from Pakistani East Punjab and Indian West PUnjab. Do you want to do that? Didn’t think so. The best thing to do then is to leave the Sikhs alone and stop pernicious and cynical interference in their internal affairs. Only an idiot pulls at the mane of a sleeping lion.
      Also as you are not a Sikh ironically you may not be aware that when you say ‘Answer is Reunification of all three states and may be even Jammu’ you are going a long way to reconstitute the territories of Maharajah Ranjit Singh’s ‘Khalsa Raj’. Reviving memories and public awareness of his Sikh Empire will make it harder for the Hinduvta agenda to dilute and adulterate Sikh identity which draws a lot of its strength from its history as well as spiritual faith. So let’s reunify as you want and therefore reconstitute the Khalsa Raj with the Sikhs ruling as they did when they last owned all these lands under the Sikh Empire when both Hindus and Muslims were very content to live under Sikh auspices as we have a clear historical precedent set by Maharajah Ranjit SIngh who was both a pious Sikh and a secular minded Sovereign as the two characteristics go together. Sikhs are not going to be ruled in their own homeland by non Sikhs and that includes the likes of Badal and anyone else who wears a turban and beard but abandons Sikh principles.
      Also the constituent parts of Great Britain are separate countries – Wales, Northern Ireland, Scotland and England – which have their own national assemblies as well as a UK Parliament. Those assemblies have the power to set their own laws as can clearly be seen in Scotland which even has a Scottish Pound and education system and recently enjoyed a referendum to stay or leave the union. Still want the Sikhs in Punjab to enjoy such liberalism and freedom to express their identity? Didn’t think so.

  5. ‘Haryana government has claimed that it was neither asking for charity nor demanding Punjab’s share. That SYL-Canal was just a passage of allotted waters of Ravi-Beas Rivers to Haryana’. Certainly it is not charity is it has been straightforward theft in broad daylight over decades and as for demanding its fair share that was allotted by whom exactly? Certainly not the Punjabi people who unlike those who created Haryana in 1966 have never had any referendum to decide the matter. There is a deliberate misconception peddled that Punjab has abundant river water which is totally false and according to Helsinki Rules 1966 and the Indian Constitution (Entry 17 of List ii under Seventh Schedule), Punjab, as the riparian state, is entitled to the entire water of its rivers. ‘The rivers of Punjab have a total of 28.5 M. A. F. water. Rajasthan takes away 11.2 M.A.F. of the Punjab river waters (8.6 M.A.F. through the Rajasthan Canal, 1.5 M.A.F. through the Bhakra Canal and 1.1 M.A.F. through the Bikaner Canal). And, Haryana has been allotted 7.83 M.A.F. (4.33 M.A.F. goes from the Satluj through the Bhakra Canal. Besides this, 1.62 M.A.F. out of 3.5 M.A.F. alloted from the Ravi-Beas system also runs through the Bhakra canal. The remaining 1.88 M.A.F. is a bone of contention. (Over and above this, Haryana takes 5.6 M.A.F. from the Yamuna and also uses the entire 1.1 M.A.F. water of the Ghaggar.) Punjab is left with 9.47 M.A.F. Most people do not know that Haryana gets more water than Punjab, although it has less area than Punjab. (Punjab has 50362 sq. kilo metres of area while Haryana has 44212 sq.kilo metres.)’

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