Tragedy of Punjab: Operation Bluestar & After

Operation Bluestar. The bloody storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar in the first week of June 1984. The Sikhs bitter and in anguish. The Hindus of Punjab relieved that Bhindranwale lay dead and hopefully, terrorism stamped out. And each community quit oblivious, quite uncaring of the other’s sentiments. That is the tragedy of Punjab, and India’s gravest crisis of nationhood since 1947. What brought this about is what this book lays bare. And what can now be done is what it explores. The two renowned authors probe the historical-and more recent-genesis of what has become the wide Hindu-Sikh chasm. And they reveal the cynical power-play and political maneuverings which paved the way both for Bhindranwale to become a cult-figure and for the subsequent armoured assault on the holiest of Sikh shrines. This book provides a blow-by-blow account of Operation Bluestar and raises disturbing, controversial questions as to its advisability and execution; and after Bluestar, the often clumsy ‘healing touch’. There is hate in the air in Punjab, and rumours, suspicion and bitterness and the authors find little evidence that what must be done is indeed being done.