Remembering 1984
It has been 18 years since "Operation Blue Star," 1984.
It is hard to believe that it has been so long. I still remember where I was
and what I was doing when I heard the news. I was a teenager at the time. I
was living in the U.S. I barely remembered India since I had moved here when
I was small. That day, I was listening to music in my bedroom when my Mom came
in to tell me. Those words of what was going on in India, at the Golden Temple,
really tore me apart. I didn't understand it. I felt helpless. And I wept for
a very long time.
I can never forget 1984. But I feel that many Sikhs want to. No
one likes to talk about it. Some try to convince themselves that 1984 and the
massacres in the aftermath of the Gandhi assassination were not that bad. Even
worse, they blame Sikhs for bringing it upon themselves. These Sikhs are in
denial. The all-out attack on the Golden Temple and other Gurduaaras was completely
unjustified. And the brutal massacres of Sikhs, thereafter, was absolutely a
state-sponsored genocide. We need to remember these events every year and tell
the next generation of what really happened.
Denial is a dangerous position to take. If we Sikhs don't remember 1984 for what it really was, then the whole world will forget it too. It is said that those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.