Key Points;
Late KPS Gill's nephew and Indian journalist Hartosh Singh Bal explained in an article on Scroll that Gill's brutal approach during the insurgency period in Punjab had been exaggerated.
He cited statistics based on data from the Institute for Conflict Management and claimed that during Gill's absence the killings were higher.
Bal wrote when Gill returned for his second tenure as the DGP of Punjab, both civilian and terrorist killings had dropped significantly by 9%.
DILJIT DOSANJH’S SATLUJ and its removal from the Zee5 streaming platform have reignited the debate over the alleged extrajudicial killings and secret cremations that took place during the insurgency period (mid-1980s to mid-1990s) in Punjab, India.
During that time, Kanwal Pal Singh, also known as KPS Gill, served as the Director General of the Punjab Police and eventually became known as the "super cop" who brought the Punjab insurgency under control.However, his policing methods were often criticized for violating human rights and were widely regarded as extremely brutal.
Human rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra gained widespread attention for his investigation, which claimed that more than 25,000 people were killed during the insurgency in Punjab. Khalra's work also alleged that between 1984 and 1994, security forces kidnapped people, carried out extrajudicial killings, and conducted more than 2,000 secret cremations in Amritsar alone.
As the head of the Punjab Police, Gill was often criticized for his policing tactics and methods. However, how many of these deaths can actually be attributed to Gill's tenure as Director General of the Punjab Police? KPS Gill served in this role from 1988 to 1990 and then again from 1991 until his retirement in 1995.
In an exclusive article, Hartosh Singh Bal, editor of The Caravan presented numbers and statistics that questioned whether Gill's brutal approach had been exaggerated. Bal is also the nephew of late KPS Gill who passed away in 2017 at the age of 82. On July 9, 2017, Bal's article, titled "Lessons Not Learnt: The Left and Right Have Distorted KPS Gill's Success Against Terrorism," was published on Scroll.
Hartosh Singh Bal cited statistics based on data from the Institute for Conflict Management, which showed that the number of killings during KPS Gill's tenure was comparatively lower than during the tenures of his predecessors and successors.
In an excerpt from Endgame in Punjab, Gill wrote that former Prime Minister of India V. P. Singh, who held office from 1989 to 1990, believed that "All that was required was a little symbolism, a few sympathetic, sentimental gestures, and the violence, the terror, would melt away" to control the situation in Punjab. After V. P. Singh handed over power to Chandra Shekhar, who served as Prime Minister from November 10, 1990, to June 21, 1991, the situation in Punjab worsened.
According to Bal's article, by that time, KPS Gill's first tenure as the Director General of Punjab Police had ended, and civilian killings had increased by 16%. He further emphasized that the number of terrorists killed while KPS Gill was not serving as the DGP of Punjab had risen to 184, exceeding the previous figure of 110.
He further added that when Gill returned for his second tenure as the DGP of Punjab, both civilian and terrorist killings had dropped significantly by 9%.
See also: Was Jaswant Singh Khalra Flirting with the Khalistani Movement? Old Video Reignites the Debate
One of the most widely known aspects of Gill's tenure was his expansion of the bounty system for killing militants in the state, which allegedly led to widespread extrajudicial killings by the Punjab Police. This controversial decision by Gill, who was leading the force at the time, drew widespread criticism for allegedly violating human rights in an effort to bring the insurgency under control.
Bal quoted Gill's article—Endgame in Punjab, in which he wrote about how young officers were posted to dangerous areas. "One involved a radical policy of postings and promotions through which sensitive areas and critical operations were headed by officers (often very young officers) who were willing to confront dangers and take personal initiatives, and most of whom volunteered for these high-risk assignments," the article read.
Bal further claimed that the numbers disseminated through several narratives are "distorted" and argued that using data from the state's most violence-affected districts would not produce an accurate estimate. He wrote that between 1981 and 2000, around 27% of the violent incidents occurred in three districts (Amritsar, Tarn Taran, and Majitha). Based on this, Bal argued that the figure would be around 7,650 unidentified cremations, which is lower than the number that has been widely spread.
Calling Gill's approach successful, the writer further wrote that the recent narrative surrounding KPS Gill and his brutality is similar to shutting one's eyes to the reality of Punjab's escape from violence and the insurgency period.
[VS]
(Edited by Ritik Singh)
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