[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1674-E1675]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

COUNCIL OF KHALISTAN WRITES TO CHIEF MINISTER TO DEMAND WITHDRAWAL OF
WARRANT AGAINST DR. UDHOKE AND RELEASE OF MANN

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HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS

of new york

in the house of representatives

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Mr. TOWNS. Madam Speaker, as I have discussed recently, the Punjab
Government has issued an arrest warrant against Dr. Sukhpreet Singh
Udhoke for the crime of writing about Sikh freedom and criticizing the
chief minister. Mr. Mann's crime was placing a picture at the statue of
the brutal late chief minister, Beant Singh.
The Council of Khalistan has recently written to Chief Minister
Parkash Singh Badal to demand the withdrawal of the warrant against Dr.
Udhoke and the release of Mr. Mann. We should join in that demand,
Madam Speaker. We should stop aid and trade with India to support
rights for everyone and we should demand a free and fair vote on
freedom for Khalistan, the Sikh homeland, for Nagalim, for Kashmir, and
for the other nations seeking their freedom.
I would like to add that letter to the Record, Madam Speaker.

[[Page E1675]]

Council of Khalistan,

Washington, DC, June 28, 2007.
Hon. Parkash Singh Badal,
Chief Minister of Punjab,
Chandigarh, Punjab, India.
Dear Chief Minister Badal: I am writing to you regarding
the recent arrest warrant for Dr. Sukhpreet Singh Udhoke and
the arrests of Sardar Simranjit Singh Mann and his
associates. As you know, both were involved in peaceful
political action, which is protected under the Indian
constitution, at the time the warrants for their arrests were
issued by your government. Dr. Udhoke's offense was
publishing articles critical of you. Sardar Mann's was
protesting and placing a picture of a Sikh martyr at the
statue of the brutal, genocidal Beant Singh, who presided
over the murders of over 50,000 Sikhs. Mann had previously
been arrested for the dangerous crimes of making a speech and
raising a flag.
You have been in opposition. You have engaged in political
activities while in opposition. What would you think if you
were arrested for those activities? That is exactly what your
government is doing to S.S. Mann and proposes to do to Dr.
Udhoke as soon as you can find him.
When did the right to protest peacefully disappear in
Punjab, Khalistan? Are you determined to prove the late
General Narinder Singh right that ``Punjab is a police
state''?
On behalf of the 25 million strong Sikh Nation in Punjab,
in India, and around the world, I am writing to demand the
withdrawal of the arrest order against Dr. Udhoke and his
associates and the immediate release of Simranjit Singh Mann
and his associates. I do not do this for political reasons;
Mann has been a vocal critic of this office and has
cooperated with the Indian government. But if you truly
believe in democracy--the system that put you back in power
earlier this year--then you cannot in good conscience arrest
people for dissent.
Indeed, Mann's arrest shows what can happen to a Sikh even
if he cooperates with the Indian government, as you have done
throughout your political career to the detriment of the Sikh
Nation. One day, your utility to them will be exhausted and
they may then have you thrown in jail for a peaceful
political activity--simply because you are a Sikh. Who will
you turn to defend you then? To this office?
Yet while you seem intent on prosecuting peaceful dissent,
you are unwilling to take action against those who commit
murder and other serious crimes. Is that because of your
alliance with the BJP, which is the political arm of the pro-
Fascist, militant Hindu nationalist, anti-Sikh RSS?
When you were elected in 1997, you promised the Sikhs of
Punjab that you would appoint a commission to inquire into
the atrocities in Punjab and prosecute the police officers
who murdered Sikhs. Instead, you protected SSP Swaran Singh
Ghotna, who murdered Akal Takht Jathedar Gurdev Singh Kaunke.
Just recently, Gurmit Ram Rahim Singh was fraudulently
dressing as Guru Gobind Singh, performing baptisms that are
reserved for the Panj Piaras, and advertising it in the
newspaper. This was a desecration of the Sikh religion and a
fraud. Yet you met with Ram Rahim to ask for his political
support. But you couldn't even succeed in persuading this
corrupt baba to support you! Yet when he perpetrated this
fraud, you protected him until the political pressure to
prosecute him got too intense. He still has not been
arrested, nor has an arrest warrant been issued. I guess
the jails are too crowded from holding the likes of Dr.
Sukhbir Singh Udhoke and Simranjil Singh Mann.
In 1978, during your Chief Ministership, the Nirankari cult
had a meeting and desecrated the Guru Granlh Sahib. Sant
Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his supporters peacefully
protested outside. Your police fired on the protestors,
killing 13 of them, then your police escorted the Nirankari
leader, Gurbachan Singh, safely out of Punjab.
Apparently, you were not through trying to destroy Sant
Bhindranwale. According to letters reprinted in the book
Chakravyuh: Web of Indian Secularism, you, along with
Harcharan Singh Longowal and the late Gurcharan Singh Tohra,
invited the Indian government to attack the Golden Temple in
June 1984 to kill Sant Bhindranwale. 37 other Gurdwaras were
attacked simultaneously. Over 20,000 Sikhs were killed in
those attacks. Their blood is on your hands, Mr. Chief
Minister.
Furthermore, your government in your previous term was the
most corrupt in Punjab's history. You creatively invented a
new term for bribery; ``fee for service.'' No fee, no
service. The sale of government offices was standard
operating procedure. Your wife even developed the handy skill
of being able to tell how much money was in a bag just
picking it up.
Furthermore, your operatives are calling this office
repeatedly and harassing me about my website because it
exposes you. You may be able to suppress the freedom of Sikhs
in Punjab, but you cannot stop the Sikh diaspora from
exposing your brutal and corrupt acts. Remember that Sikhs
have a long memory of those who are traitors and murderers
and who cooperate with the oppressors of the Sikh Nation.
K.P.S. Gill's turban is still preserved in Belgium. When
Khalsitan is free, it will be on display so that the Sikh
Nation will never forget those who committed atrocities
against us.
Punjab's water is being taken away by non-riparian states
without compensation. At least your predecessor, who is from
the Congress Party, the enemy of all Sikhs, tried to do
something about it. He cancelled the water agreements. The
bill passed by the Legislative Assembly expressly affirmed
the sovereignty of Punjab.
Under your rule, the economy of Punjab is deteriorating.
Sikh farmers are committing suicide because they cannot make
a living, due to the fact that your friends in Delhi force
them to pay exorbitant prices for fertilizer and seeds, but
forces them to sell their crop at substandard prices. And
you, who as Chief Minister and head of the Akali Dal are
supposed to protect the interests of the Sikhs, sit there and
kowtow to these criminals.
Even though the government of Pakistan said it would build
a road to Kartapur, where Guru Nanak went to his heavenly
abode, with no visas, your government has refused to build
the Punjab side of the road so that Sikhs can go freely to
this sacred site.
From these actions, it is clear where your loyalties lie,
and they are not with the Sikh Nation or with the Sikh
religion or with the people of Punjab, but with the violent,
pro-Fascist, murderous Hinducrat thugs from Delhi who sponsor
you and your career. But remember the warning I gave you
earlier; when they are through with you, when you no longer
have any usefulness to them, they will dispense with you as
they have dispensed with so many other Sikhs who have served
them.
That is why it is incumbent on every Sikh to engage in the
``long struggle'' to free Khalistan. Only then will Sikhs
such as Dr. Udhoke, Sardar Mann, and even the likes of you be
protected from the violent and brutal whims of the oppressive
Hindustani regime. It is crucial to protect the Sikh religion
and the Sikh Nation from this oppression by liberating
Khalistan today, in accord with our declaration of October 7,
1987. For your good, Mr. Badal, I urge you to get on the
right side of history today. Or would you rather be
remembered as an enemy of the Sikh Nation?
Sincerely,
Gurmit Singh Aulakh,
President, Council of Khalistan.

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