Police officials, serving and retired, who have been involved in dealing with terrorism in Punjab and made immense contribution towards restoring peace in the state are feeling badly betrayed and let down over the narrative projecting members of the police force as rogues and monsters. While one particular ecosystem has been consistently maligning the police, silence of the political class and the civil society by choosing to ignore the malicious and vilifying campaign against the police is the most painful. People know that had the police not fought while putting everything at stake, Punjab might well not have been what it is today.
Several police officials from different ranks this newspaper spoke to, expressed shock and pain over the way policemen were being talked about, as if everyone was a rogue, while ignoring their sacrifices. “The way the narrative is being constructed, every cop is feeling disillusioned and regretful. Is this the reward they deserve for putting their own lives and that of their close ones at stake?”
Post “Satluj” controversy, everyone seems to have started believing that Punjab in those days was like it is now and it was only the rogue policemen who abducted people, killed them wantonly and threw their bodies into the river Satluj.
No, Punjab was not what it is today. Punjab would shut down by 5 in the evening. There was no guarantee that anyone who stepped out of his/ her home would return live. People were killed wantonly and those who killed the innocent had no regret or remorse. All of them were doing it with great pride, even invoking religious beliefs. It is not difficult to imagine the horror of the people being pulled out of buses, trains, shops and homes just for who they were, lined up and shot one by one, similar to what the ISIS did in Syria and Iraq, and the ISI-backed terrorists did with tourists in Pahalgam last year.
Imagine the plight of a policeman serving in Tarn Taran district those days. Tarn Taran is not an easy posting even now. While during the militancy era, it was described as the ‘Republic of Khalistan’, where nobody’s writ ran except of the terrorists, in today’s times, it is the heartland of gangster culture in Punjab.
“Accepting a posting in Tarn Taran during late 1980s and early 1990s was like signing your own death warrant,” remarked a senior police officer, who was actively involved in anti-terrorist operations, particularly in the Tarn Taran/ Gurdaspur belt. Still no police official declined a posting in this area. While entire Punjab was high-risk area, as no place was safe, Tarn Taran was the worst.
Leading a police force against the highly motivated, thoroughly indoctrinated and militarily trained militants was not an ordinary thing. It was actually a war-like situation, rather worse than a war. “In the war you know the fire will come from the front, in this war of insurgency, nobody knows from which side one will get shot at and may be shot dead,” said the police officer who has spent a good number of years in the Tarn Taran/ Gurdaspur belt.
Also read: ‘Satluj’ reinforces a persecution complex that refuses to go
The police officials have a genuine grouse that they are now being judged for their sacrifices during the most turbulent times from the current day standards when Punjab is as peaceful as any other state in the country. An entire new generation has been born and has grown up since 1995. This generation has no idea what it used to be like in those days. This generation easily gets influenced and carried away with what is fed to it, particularly through social media.
While the story of unlawful killing of Jaswant Singh Khalra needs to be told, along with it the tale of Punjab’s darkest era also needs to be told to this generation.
This generation needs to be told how teenage children of police officials were ruthlessly killed by the militants. Govind Ram, one of the veterans in the fight against militancy, not only lost his own life, but saw his son, who was studying in class XI, being killed by militants just because he was a police officer’s son. Govind Ram was killed in a bomb blast later.
There are many others like Govind Ram and the list is very long. It started with the killing of DIG AS Atwal, who was gunned down outside the Darbar Sahib parikrama. Then there were two young IPS officers, Arvinder Singh Brar and KRS Gill, who were gunned down while they were on a morning walk in Patiala. Another DIG Ajit Singh was killed in an encounter with terrorists. Another officer Sheetal Das was also gunned down. Besides, there were about 1,800 cops of different ranks who were mercilessly killed during that period.
And today the same police are being damned and vilified as if the entire police force was rogue. Incidents like that of the disappearance of Jaswant Singh Khalra and a few more were aberrations and exceptions. Even all those “unidentified” bodies claimed to have been cremated as anonymous, were not all innocent or non-combatants. Most of them were active militants, involved in killings, and their families refused to claim or accept their bodies.
It is high time the political leaders, cutting across party lines, not only stop vilifying the police, but come to its defence. No police force in the world had succeeded in finishing insurgencies and militancy like the Punjab Police did. There might have been some rogue elements but most of them have already been dealt with according to the law.
Instead of trying to be politically correct and playing to the gallery, people like Iqbal Singh Lalpura, who started as an Assistant Sub Inspector in Punjab Police, then rose to become a DIG and is now senior BJP leader, must not contribute towards building up an anti-police narrative that vilifies the force.
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