Shutdown in India's Punjab over anti-Sikh riots

Nov 3, 2009, 9:04 GMT

   New Delhi - Traffic was disrupted and schools closed in several towns in India's northern state of Punjab Tuesday due to a day-long shutdown called by radical Sikh groups to protest alleged inaction against those involved in the anti-Sikh riots of 1984, news reports said.

   More than 3,000 Sikhs were killed, largely in Delhi according to official figures, in riots following the assassination of then-prime minister Indira Gandhi in 1984 by her Sikh bodyguards.

   To date, 20 people have been convicted of murder during the 1984 riots in which Sikh activists claim more than 4,000 were killed and thousands left homeless.

   'We have not got justice for Sikhs in the last 25 years. We want the deaf government in the centre to listen to our demands,' Dal Khalsa leader Kanwarpal Singh was quoted as saying by IANS news agency.

   Dal Khalsa activists stopped trains in the town of Amritsar where the holiest Sikh shrine, the Golden temple, is located.

   Several long-distance trains originating from the towns of Amritsar, Ferozepur and Ludhiana were cancelled as protestors squatted on tracks and set up blockades on the mainline linking Delhi with the northern state of Jammu and Kashmir.

   Shops, petrol pumps and a few banks remained closed in several towns in Punjab. Schools were shut by authorities as a precautionary measure. Public transport was affected by road blocks.

   Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal urged people to hold peaceful demonstrations. 'We will ensure that law and order is maintained. People can protest peacefully,' Badal said.

   While Punjab state is governed by Akali Dal, a regional party representing the Sikhs, the Congress party, to which Gandhi belonged, is the leading partner in India's federal coalition government.