Women are no strangers to cruelty, brutality, and injustice in a patriarchal society that thrives on power structures, a place where almost inevitably, violence becomes a gendered space. Centuries of women have been silenced and their cries muzzled against voicing the atrocities meted out to them. This is exactly what makes The Kaurs of 1984: The Untold, Unheard Stories of Sikh Women by Sanam Sutirath Wazir, a watershed moment in accounting for these near-lost voices. The author, as part of his rigorous research, documents an in-depth, heart-wrenching account of the suffering of those who bear witness to brutal violence in the wake of the anti-Sikh 1984 riots in the capital. With this book, for the first time, the voices and memories of Sikh women have been used to reconstruct – openly and in graphic, often horrifying, detail – not just the Sikh massacre but also the turbulent politics of the period and the hellish limbo that came in the aftermath of the violence.
A bloody history
The year 1984 has become etched in the collective social memory of not only the Sikhs but also of citizen groups. This record of marginalised women’s voices that stemmed from the author’s report for Amnesty International charts all the notes of the shrieks and sobs of “unidentified” women. The author traces the arc of militancy acts and feelings interwoven to enliven a time when Punjab was fraught with militancy that saw its bloodiest face-off with the state as the troops stormed the holiest shrine of the Sikhs; the rest, as they say, is history.
The book charts graphic vistas that one can’t turn away from – the inside of the Golden Temple, the seat of first instances of violence to the aftermath of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots to the aftermath of Operation Blue Star – with the capital at the heart of the conflict.
Setting the tone of the book is the foreword, where Uma Chakravarti, whose work along with Nandita Haksar in 1985 on eyewitness accounts, outlines how the research was carried out initially from the ground up. “Sanam’s book, through its narratives, picks up on many threads opened but not fully explored to date. It includes for the first time, in my knowledge, the terrible violence suffered by women caught in the vortex of happenings that were not of their making – women who were in the Golden Temple when Operation Blue Star was launched in June 1984.”
Sanam notes, “The passage of time since then, the voices of the Kaurs who lived through unimaginable horror and trauma have been silenced. And once I became aware of this silence, I wanted to undo it. I wanted to ensure that the voices of these survivors were heard and their stories remembered”. It reads as a critical archive of oral accounts of those who bore witness to the terror of 1984, not just of the November killings but also the violence and killings entailed by Operation Blue Star. He places the trauma of the women – mothers, daughters, and wives – at the centre of it all. Giving their interiority a voice to silent tears, of the quiet that has overtaken their soul is broken as they articulate their pain to be etched for posterity, as they slowly rebuilt their lives, gaining respect and worthy acknowledgement of their stoic calm and tenacity and feminine strength and light in the “heart of darkness”.
The book is a personal passion project of the author as he maps its trajectory. One time, his mother encouraged the author when he was facing self-doubt about speaking on behalf of the women. he wondered if he could actually feel their pain.
“No, you can’t,” said my mother. “Believe me, no one can. But you can be their voice. You can be honest and take your readers through their journey. Finish your work for Amnesty and then tell me in detail about everything that happened to these women. I want to hear from you.” And she added, “If you want to write about them, your gender should be the last thing that stops you.”
Hitherto unrecorded or unarchived, these women are seen and heard, finally, witness to the violence faced from across Karol Bagh to Moti Bagh, from Connaught Place to Chandni Chowk, anything that belonged to the Sikhs, be it commercial properties or vehicles, fell prey to the mobs that were on a rampage across the national capital.
‘We will grow in doubles’
The book chronicles dreams gone sour like that of Satwant, in Nangloi who, as a 13-year-old, wanted to sing like Lata Mangeshkar but life had other plans for her as she faced the brunt of the riots years later, in 1984. “I lay there helplessly, watching my home go up in flames. I thought of going inside to get the money out of my trunk, but within minutes, everything fell apart. My house was gutted, and so were all my hopes. I was trying to get up and go inside the burning house to save whatever I could, but I was unable to stand up. My legs felt numb. An old woman tried to help me. But she was warned loudly of the consequences of protecting a Sikh woman.”
Sanam poignantly brings forth the oral history that can’t be muted and documents in this book about a country, a political system, and the fourth estate that failed the women. There are stories of women that can’t be silenced, as resonated in the ditty: “Indira sadi datri, assi Indira de soye Jeon Jeon Indra Wad di, assi doon sawaye hoye. Indira is our axe, we are the grass. As she cuts us down, we will grow in doubles.”
Each woman’s story is different yet similar; for Darshan Kaur, from Trilokpuri, the carnage of 1984 brought back the horrors of Partition as she speaks of the impossibility of encapsulating the challenges that women face. “There are so many ifs and buts for women in our society that at times, even the women themselves don’t want to do things which can make their lives better or which can make them happy. We often make ourselves sad in order to make others happy, but in the end, no one is actually happy. All they have are complaints. The reality is that men want to control us. I think that makes them happy. We are living a hellish life with no justice. Our men were killed and our homes were looted. We were robbed of whatever we had. And they want us to forget and move on. Do you think that’s possible? I will only get closure when I close my eyes.”
In her 11 months in illegal detention, another survivor, Kulbir Kaur wrote more than 60 letters, all of them addressed to holders of political power at the time, including Simranjit Singh Mann, the SGPC, Congress leader Jagmeet Singh Bara, activist Bimla Dang, Comrade Satpal Dang and the jail superintendent and the DC of Patiala. What she writes could well sum up the agony and the anguish of the women at the receiving end of injustice: “I am not scared of death; if you have a gun then I have my pen with me. We are fighting for truth and justice, unlike you who are fighting for lies and personal gains. I believe in the courts of law and I will demand justice from them.”
The book, as a witness to history that will never be forgotten or forgiven, is an essential read.
The Kaurs of 1984: The Untold, Unheard Stories of Sikh Women, Sanam Sutirath Wazir, HarperCollins India.
