Why the Khalistan Separatist Movement Is Neither Sikh Nor Liberal
The Khalistan movement not only adheres to the bigotry, extremism, patriarchy, and violence prevalent among the Jihadi terrorist groups but also has close ties with them in operational and strategic matters.
India has long suffered from separatist movements, e.g., Nagaland and Mizoram in the northeast and Kashmir and Punjab in the northwest. Amongst them, Punjab’s Khalistan insurgency was the bloodiest and most dangerous. Between 1980 and 2000, in the Khalistan insurgency, 11,694 civilians, 1,784 security forces, and 8,069 militants died. The Khalistan movement aimed at the creation of an independent state, namely Khalistan. Massively supported by Pakistan, it was Pakistani General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq’s strategy to bleed India through “a thousand cuts” to avenge the defeat of the 1971 war. The movement petered out by the early 1990s; however, lately, it has been on the upswing again.