The Vaisakhi Massacre 1978

It’s surprising how fast history is forgotten. It seems like no one remembers what happened on Vaisakhi of 1978, well no one outside the realm of a few internet forums which make one relive important historical events from time to time.

Recently I went up to 10 people who grew up in India and would have had good memory of the event at the time in ’78. Only 2 people recalled event without any help. And how can the whole ‘adherlay born’ bias be explained? The people coming from India today are many times more spiritually devoid than anyone can imagine…

This exactly explains why people like badal keep getting elected time and time again. The best way to explain this day in history is this keertan.org speech of Bibi Harsharan Kaur Jee from New Jersey from a few years ago.

A word about Bibi Jee: she lived a long with with Bhai Sahib Bhai Randheer Singh jee, which explains her outlook and poise. When she talks the most important people from all spheres listen and don’t dare talk in front of her. In this speech she clearly lays the entire blame on Parkash Badal, in denying justice to the shaheedhs.

One thing I’ve noticed is anything which you listen repetitively and don’t get bored of listening, is something special, not like the geet which ‘becomes beha by the mid-day’ I must have listened to it about 10 times today and its still resonating deeply.

Bibi Harsharan Kaur is the only women in the past 40 years of her caliber, I dont see anyone even closely matching what she is. She isn’t a puppet like other politicians, when asked about what she has acheived, she always attributes all that is her to the sangat of gursikhs like Bhai Shaib Bhai Randheer Singh.

See also this Fort: Panthkhalsa article

To listen to the speech click here

To download the speech click here

Loose Transcript is given below:
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… From April 1978 onwards ones who have done ardass to defend the honor of the living joyt of the ten Gurus, Sahib Shri Guru Granth Sahib Jee to stop the slanderous procession by laying down their lives. Open ground… no support, no wall, no defensive position, just a straight open road… On the one side the entire bustling Nirankari town from there their bullets raining down from the other side the police sending a hail of bullets at the Singhs. Because the police did not want Bhai Fauja Singh and others to interfere with the Nirankari program.

Fauja Singh was such a personality… I have spend a lot of time with both of them. The one who you call Sant Jarnail Singh jee, he used to call me a mother-like elder sister. I had always known him as my younger brother. Because he was my elder daughter’s age. Whatever he did something, he would call everyone and have a discussion about the matter at hand.

My benti to you, the sangat is: Shaheeds cannot be divided, Shaheeds are commonly shared throughout time. However we sometimes make one soul so great that… Like Shaheeds like Baba Deep Singh Jee, that shaheedi has not become old Khalsa Jee. We can make historical additions, but we should not take earlier historical events and start from a newer chosen beginning. Shaheedhi day of Shri guru Arjan Dev Jee, without talking about them…. Where have we learnt about the concept of Shaheedhi? We haven’t learnt this ourselves. It has been passed down to us by Shri Guru Arjan Dev Jee himself. Why were Sikhs scalped alive, sawn in half, cut limb by limb? Shaheedhi was passed down to them.

By becoming shaheeds neither do we die or reach a higher plane, the greatness is the Guru’s. The guru who has given us amrit through the Khandhaa and Bata. The Khanda is two-planed and thus it ensures that you live in maya by being detached from it; it has enabled you to live while having your head chopped off.

My benti to you today in regards to shaheedi is to present the history of shaheeds in its entirety from beginning to end so that our children can understand the whole story.

If the April 1978 massacre never took place, I’m telling you that the following Morchai, protests, massacres would have had no room for them.

The story of Bota Singh and Garja Singh: they heard soldiers saying that we have killed off all Sikhs now. They decided to prove to them that Sikhs were alive and well. So they blocked off the road and declared that its Khalsa trerritory and began to charge tax of 1 taka for a donkey and 1anna for a cart. They stood there back to back attained shaheedhi while they fought the army. No one asked them to be shaheedh, no one told them to get shaheedh.

The thing is that the each and every Sikh has inside of them the same drop of Amrit which makes their thinking the same: that the Panth must live even if it means that I die. Besides this there has never been any other thinking or concept.

My benti to you is that there is nothing more beautiful than the history of Shaheedhs. Children must lean who we are and how we live. But this history must be told from the start. Just like in ardass how it begins and ends in the same manner, the story of shaheedhs must be told in the same chronological order.

These shaheedhis started in 1978. 87 or 88 were wounded, the first shot that hit Bhai Fauja Singh went in from the left eye and blew the entire skull from the back side. He went behind a truck and took his dumala and tightened it with dripping blood shouted only one Jakara and said to the singhs that no one should leave.

Badal’s boat has sunk! I fought the 13 cases of the shaheedhs against the Nirankaris DSP Joshi, was used in the court case and he took .5Million and the case that we had won, we lost.

Today kathavachaks come here and say that Baba Deep Singh Jee could not have fought as he did…

…The entire Khalsa Raj in within this Bata of Amrit. The drop of amrit is the only thing that will make the Panth stronger. Whenever you talk about anything start from the Guru.