Video clips of dead, clean-shaven men from Punjab’s dark days of militancy on the X feed of Union Minister of State for Railways Ravneet Singh Bittu are being viewed with grave concern by both his fellow BJP leaders as well as Opposition leaders in the state.
Speaking to The Tribune, senior BJP leader Manoranjan Kalia advocated restraint. “Punjab needs to remember that even during the darkest hours of terrorism, the state never witnessed communal clashes, even during the peak of the 1984 riots. That is why the videos posted by fellow party leader Ravneet Bittu on his X handle are not in the right direction. We need to bury our painful past and move ahead.”
Kalia was reacting to an archival documentary clip on the aftermath of a blast in Punjab targeting the minority community that was shared on Bittu’s X handle. “We lived as pehredars (guards) during those dark days. So even now, instead of providing fodder for a possible repeat of the past, we need to learn from our mistakes for a harmonious future. Selective videos and pictures do not tell the whole truth,” he added.
Asked why he was uploading videos and clips of dead people from the militancy era that clearly identified the community they belonged to, Bittu refused to comment. “The government has no role in allowing or stopping the screening of the ‘Satluj’ movie,” he told The Tribune.
Punjab Congress leaders, both MLAs and MPs, said they were disturbed by the uploads and questioned how they were being allowed and how they had got past X’s strict content norms.
Congress MLA from Jalandhar Cantt Pargat Singh said, “The BJP is hell-bent on disturbing the hard-earned peace of Punjab. He (Bittu) is purely working on a political agenda of polarising voters. The timing of releasing and then banning the movie ahead of the elections raises several questions,” he told The Tribune.
Former Punjab BJP president Sunil Jakhar said, “The issue that Bittu is referring to is very sensitive. I would like to go through all the details and will address the media shortly.”
Current BJP president Kewal Dhillon refused to comment on the issue. “I can only say that the period in question during the Congress rule was among the most unfortunate the state ever witnessed,” he said.
However, senior BJP leader and former national vice-president of the party, Laxmi Kanta Chawla, who hails from Amritsar, did not hold back. “Showing the black history of Punjab selectively is not good for Punjab and Punjabis. Bittu should refrain from posting such videos. If he is keen to show the reality to future generations, he should quote from ‘The Kashmir Files’ and ‘The Kerala Story’ and get a project done on Punjab Files. If he is genuinely concerned about peace, he should get the screenings of ‘Satluj’, which are reportedly being held across the state, stopped.”
Chandigarh Congress MP Manish Tewari said, “Punjab went through a very traumatic phase between 1980 and 1995 when it became the first frontier in Pakistan’s strategy to bleed India with a thousand cuts. The only thing that saved Punjab was the bond between Hindus and Sikhs — the composite culture of Punjab, Punjabi and Punjabiyat. There is nothing to be achieved by continuously scratching the barely healed wounds of that decade and a half. Anything that weakens Punjab’s composite identity only plays into the hands of the ISI. Politicians across party lines must realise the sensitivity of living cheek by jowl with Pakistan.”
Kalia pointed out that “terrorism in Punjab is a very complex subject. I feel there is no need to make movies like ‘Satluj’ or pass comments on the issue because they cannot do justice to a correct portrayal of those days. Depending on which side you defend, the story will never be complete.”