India

India is the republic in which most Sikhs live. In the 2011 census it counted about 20.8 million Sikhs, 1.7 percent of its people, and about 16 million of them live in Punjab (Al Jazeera). This page records the main points where the Panth and the Indian state have met, in order.

Key moments

• 1947: Partition cut the Punjab in two. The Sikh delegation opposed Pakistan, and its leaders proposed a separate Sikh province or state (Encyclopaedia of Sikhism).
• When the Constitution was adopted, Sardar Hukam Singh refused to sign it because he had not secured protection for Sikhs as a religious minority (Encyclopaedia of Sikhism).
• 1 November 1966: a Punjabi-speaking state came into being after the Punjabi Suba movement.
• October 1973: the Anandpur Sahib Resolution asked for an autonomous region, an integral part of the Union, with the Centre keeping foreign relations, defence, currency and communications.
• June to November 1984: the army entered Sri Harmandir Sahib, with an official toll of about 400 against Sikh groups' figure of thousands (Al Jazeera). After Indira Gandhi's killing by two Sikh bodyguards on 31 October, mobs killed Sikhs; official estimates are about 3,350 across the country and over 5,000 by human rights organisations (The Tribune).
• 24 July 1985: the Rajiv-Longowal Accord. The Tribune says most of its promises were never implemented.
• 11 August 2005 and 17 December 2018: Manmohan Singh apologised in the Rajya Sabha for 1984, and the Delhi High Court convicted Sajjan Kumar and sentenced him to life.
• 2020 to 2021: farmers, mainly from Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, protested for more than a year, and Parliament repealed the three farm laws on 29 November 2021 (Al Jazeera).

The state's position on Khalistan. The government rejects the demand. It lists Babbar Khalsa International as a "terrorist" organisation, says Pakistan's intelligence service funds it, which Islamabad denies, and has objected to referendums held abroad. When Canada said in September 2023 that it was pursuing credible allegations linking agents of the Indian government to the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, India's foreign ministry called them "absurd and motivated" (Al Jazeera, The Conversation, Global News).