New Delhi: The grenade attack on Amritsar’s Nirankari Bhawan that killed three people and injured at least 20 has brought back memories of Punjab’s bloody past.
While the identity of the attackers – and the masterminds, if any -- can be ascertained only after investigations are complete, to many residents of Punjab and people familiar with the state’s history, the target of the attack will ring alarm bells.
The strike on the Nirankari religious gathering does appear to be a deliberate attempt to create tension and disturb the peace in the state, which has left behind its darkest years.
Who are the Nirankaris?
While the term 'Nirankari' has arguably been in use for more than two centuries, the Nirankari sect in its modern avatar was founded by Baba Buta Singh in 1929.
Ever since, it has had a tense relationship with Sikhism, or at least the Sikh clergy, as Buta Singh’s teachings were seen by orthodox Sikhs to be opposed to the tenets of Sikhism.
Today, the Nirankari sect claims to have more than a crore followers spread across several parts of the world. While it’s difficult to independently confirm that figure, there is little doubt that its followers run into several lakhs.
Feuds boil over
The simmering disputes between radical Sikhs and the Nirankaris took a bloody turn on 13 April 1978 when 13 Sikhs were killed in a clash with the Nirankaris. The event is considered to be a milestone in Punjab’s descent into militancy.
The slain men were followers of a man called Sant Bhindranwale, who emerged from the shadows and over the next few years took control of the radical Sikh cause. Bhindranwale sought to project the political grievances of Sikhs using a religious idiom, in the process lighting a fire that burned Punjab for the next two decades.
In 1978, the Sikh’s highest religious body Akal Takht excommunicated Sikhs who were part of the Nirankari sect, thus inflaming an already volatile situation.