Sikh body for fresh petition in Canadian House
Friday, April 15, 2011
The Tribune
Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), a New York-based human rights advocacy group, along with two other Sikh outfits from Canada has agreed to pursue a Parliamentary motion in Canada seeking recognition of attacks carried out against Sikhs in November 1984 as “genocide”.
According to SFJ’s legal advisor Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a consensus regarding the issue was reached between the SFJ, Ontario Gurdwaras Committee and another outfit of Ontario-based Sikhs at a recent conference in Canada.
“A large number of Sikhs attended the conference in which we presented fresh evidence and eyewitness accounts of genocidal attacks on Sikhs that took place in India in November 1984. We also announced the launch of a campaign to collect one lakh signatures for urging Canadian MPs to put forth a ‘genocide motion’ and debate in Canadian Parliament in November 2011,” he averred.
Addressing the conference, Pannun said the new evidence and eyewitness accounts in Hondh-Chillar, Pataudi and other places prove that the November 1984 attacks were “carried out with specific intent to destroy Sikh population of India”.
SFJ coordinator Jatinder Singh Grewal exhorted youth to raise the issue with the contestants in the forthcoming general elections in Canada and seek their support for moving the genocide motion in new Parliament.
Earlier, in June 2010, Liberal MPs Andrew Kania and Sukh Dhaliwal had moved a petition in Canadian Parliament regarding “Sikh genocide” to which the government responded that there is no evidence of specific intent in the case of November 1984 attacks on Sikhs.
