Talk:Sikh religious extremism

Another english language source for part of this Austria murder

http://www.hindu.com/2009/05/27/stories/2009052755571300.htm

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Vanished User 1004 (talk • contribs) 04:43, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Large cuts of unsourced content in Growth of extremism

Violence culminated in Operation Bluestar, the assassination of Indira Gandhi by 2 of her Sikh bodyguards, and the subsequent 1984 Anti-Sikh massacre. Many Sikhs perceived their holiest shrine to have been desecrated by Indian troops that stormed it, while the Government argued that Operation BlueStar and other operations were not intended to attack the Sikh faith, but to expel armed militants hiding in a place of worship. The 1984 Anti-Sikh massacre reinforced Sikh extremism, leading to an increase in political violence.

There were several terrorist attacks by Sikh militants during the Punjab insurgency periods between 1983 to 1992, including 1987 Punjab killings and 1991 Punjab killings. In the early 90s, the counter-insurgency forces were led by police officer Kanwar Pal Singh Gill himself a Sikh, who replaced Julio Francis Ribeiro. There were allegations of human rights violations against the government during the successful operations.

Sikh separatists claimed that Sikhs were being discriminated against, and that the Punjab region was not treated equally with other regions of India.<ref name="nytenvoy">GARGAN, EDWARD (October 10, 1991). "ENVOY OF ROMANIA ABDUCTED IN INDIA". The New York Times. {{cite news}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help)</ref> GlobalSecurity.org in its article "Sikhs in Punjab" noted that a February 1997 report of the United Nations Special Reporter found "that the situation of Indian Sikhs in the religious field is satisfactory." However, the article says, the reporter also indicated that he had received information of discriminatory practices in public administration, including that after Indira Gandhi's assassination Sikhs were not as heavily represented among bodyguards and the police force.<ref name="globalsecurity.org"/>

GlobalSecurity.org further reported that, in the early 1990s, journalists who did not conform to militant-approved behavior were targeted for death. There were also indiscriminate attacks designed to cause extensive civilian casualties: derailing trains, exploding bombs in markets, restaurants, and other civilian areas between Delhi and Punjab. Militants assassinated many of those moderate Sikh leaders who opposed them and sometimes killed rivals within the militant group. Many civilians who had been kidnapped by extremists were murdered if the militants' demands were not met. Hindus left Punjab by the thousands in a response to threats engineered to make them do just that. <ref name="globalsecurity.org">"Military:Sikhs in Punjab". globalsecurity.org. no date given. Retrieved 2009-05-31. {{cite web}}: |first= has generic name (help); |first= missing |last= (help); Check date values in: |date= (help)</ref>

• This has been section-flagged for months, with no noticeable citing activity. If anyone is interested in sourcing, the interested editors are certainly welcome to restore and source. I am not objecting to the content, just cutting away the unsourced.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Vanished User 1004 (talk • contribs) 23:19, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Scope

What is the scope of this article? Currently, it seems to define "Sikh extremism" as any act of violence by a Sikh. This is clearly bad synthesis.

The articles Saffron terror, Christian terrorism and Islamic terrorism don't include information about the every violent act committed by a Hindu, Christian or Muslim. Their scope is limited to the violent acts aimed at achieving politico-religious ends or motivated by religion.

This article, on the other hand, lists people like Bhagat Singh or members of the First Indian National Army, whose motivations were not religious. 90% of the article is about activities related to the Khalistan movement, and should probably be moved to something like "List of attacks attributed to the Khalistani groups". utcursch | talk 08:06, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Agree, I have always said this article is pretty naff. Sikh Extremism needs to be merged with Khalistani type things and that would exclude anything else outside that automatically. I mean at the moment it appears if a Sikh Breaks wind in an extreme way, and it has been recorded it could be included in this article :). SH 12:58, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Let's wait for comments by other editors. If there is no opposition, I'll make the necessary changes per WP:BRD. utcursch | talk 06:22, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Good discussion. I am not in favor of creating another Khalistan related article when we do have separate articles for Khalistan movement and all (or probably most) Khalistani militant organizations. I would rather move any valuable information from here to those articles to make them more informative and valuable - New user. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.179.23.228 (talk) 07:41, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

I see that one of the editor has started removing information from this article. Either this whole article should go away (deleted) and any valuable information should be moved to Khalistani articles OR the whole article should stay as it was, including pre and post 1947 extremism information. No bias please...99.179.23.228 (talk) 07:35, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

I've cleaned up the article to remove the synthesized material. Whatever remains is mostly Khalistan-related stuff, and should probably be merged with Punjab insurgency, Khalistan movement etc.

There is no point in letting "the whole article should stay as it was", because it's clearly against WP:SYN. Removing it and retaining other information is not "bias" -- the Khalistani identity is definitely based on religion. On the other hand, The references cited do not mention that Bhagat Singh, the Sikh soldiers of Netaji's INA or the Gadar conspirators were driven by Sikhism as the major motivation. "They were Sikhs" and "They were extremists" doesn't mean "They were Sikh extremists". You could as well call them "Male extremists" or "Punjabi extremists" or "North Indian extremists". utcursch | talk 07:50, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Bhagat Singh was only Sikh by birth

I don't understand why this article states that Bhagat Singh was a Sikh; he was an atheist. He wrote a short essay, in fact, called "Why I am an Atheist". It is offensive to his cause to list him as a Sikh extremist. He fought for India, not some misguided pipe-dream. — Preceding [[

So what? He was of Sikh origin and the quotations refer to him as a Sikh extremist?SH 14:00, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

See WP:SYNTHESIS. He was also a "male". That doesn't make him a "male extremist". He was also a North Indian, that doesn't make him "North Indian extremist". I could as well call him an "Indian extremist", but that would be synthesis and original research.

I don't known what do you mean by your edit summary "Due to the title of the article this article is not about Religious Sikh terrorism". Sikhism is a religion. So, the title implies "Sikh extremism" is about "Sikh religious extremism".

If you disagree, I am all for a formal formal dispute resolution. utcursch | talk 05:36, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

You just hit teh nail on the head. Does it imply "Sikh religious terrorirsm". You have to remember the Sikh faith itself is militant, and therefore by what you are saying above the whole faith could be described as a terrorist faith. THis is the reason why I have argued for a merge with teh KHalistan stuff for a long time.SH 11:27, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

To clear any confusion, I'm moving this article to Sikh religious extremism per WP:BRD. utcursch | talk 04:20, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

By doing this you have created more confusion. Just merge with the Khalistan stuff and Punjab insurgency and be done with it. Problem solved. This article was changed some years ago from Sikh Religious Extremism to this because it was proved these acts were not solely linked to religious acts. Thanks SH 20:52, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Merge

There are only two things in this article that are not related to Khalistan movement:

1. Kuka Sikhs killing some Muslim butchers over cow slaughter in 1871 -- can be merged to Namdhari
2. Protests over the play Behzti -- can be merged to Sikh Federation (UK)

The rest of the stuff should be merged to:

• Khalistan movement
• Punjab insurgency

Outside of the Khalistan movement, "Sikh extremism" is hardly notable. So, this article should most probably be redirected to Khalistan movement.

Let's wait for some opinions. If there is no opposition, we can go ahead with the merge per WP:BRD. utcursch | talk 08:13, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Most of this article is all to do with Khalistan. Lets merge it and be done with it. Thanks SH 20:23, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Going by the article history, this article was under heavy dispute for sometime. So, let's wait for a few days. If there is no opposition, let's do a merge and redirect. utcursch | talk 13:25, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Utcursch, I oppose to change name of this article to Sikh Relgious Extremism to facilitate exclusion of Sikh extremism acts from Indian Independence movement. But I do vote to move its contents to Indian Independence movement and Khalistan movement and setup a permanent redirect towards those articles. 99.179.23.228 (talk) 06:53, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

The move isn't aimed at "facilitating exclusion of Sikh extremism acts from Indian Independence movement". As I've mentioned before, you cannot call acts of people like Bhagat Singh and INA soldiers at "Sikh extremism", just as you cannot call Netaji Bose as a "Hindu extremist" -- it's a very clear violation of WP:SYN and WP:OR. By your definition of "Sikh extremism", the scope of this article would include every rapist or robber who hapepns to be a Sikh. I'm, like you, in favor of a merge, though. utcursch | talk 07:22, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Definte oppose. The notion that an article should be entitled Sikh Religious Extremism is perplexing. There does however need to be a merger to Khalistan Extremism and Indian Independence. ThanksSH 20:49, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

How is it perplexing? "Sikh extremism" means "Sikh religious extremism", because Sikhism is a religion. You cannot call Bhagat Singh or INA soldiers "Sikh extremists" for the same reason you cannot call Subhas Chandra Bose a "Hindu extremist" or Shah Nawaz Khan an "Islamic extremist". Though I agree with your second point: like I've said before, I want this article merged and redirected to Khalistan movement as well. utcursch | talk 07:22, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Also, Sikh-history and 99.179.23.228, I don't understand what is your stance. On one hand you say that "Sikh extremism" should include Indian independence activism which implies that you think that "Sikh extremism is not same as Khalistani militant activities" but includes other violent activities by anyone who happens to be a Sikh.

On the other hand, you want this article to be merged and redirected to Khalistan movement or some other article. Here, you're contracadicting yourself -- if the scope of this article does include things other than Khalistani militancy, then why should it be merged?

It's one week since I started this discussion, and there has been no opposition to merge. So, I was going to perform a merge/redirect today, but your statements have confused me. Please enlighten me about what exactly your opinion is. utcursch | talk 08:21, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

I had these debates some time ago. Have a look at the Talk Archives. My position is this. Sikhism is a Militant faith and can we wrongly construde to be and extremist faith. Sikh's have no problem in drawing the sword when all other means have failed. This injunction was imprinted on the Sikh psychi by the 10th Sikh Guru. Therin lies the problem with any article to do with Sikh Extremism. It needs to be put into a context. I think this article fails on this account. Hence why it needs multiple merging in Khalistan, Punjab Insurgency, and Indian Independence. Thanks SH 10:47, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

So, you're OK with this article being a redirect to Khalistan movement, right? utcursch | talk 12:11, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Definitely no problem with that. It needs multiple merging. Thanks SH 21:43, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

As per the above discussion, I've merged the content to:

• Khalistan movement
• List of terrorist incidents in Punjab (India)
• Namdhari
• Babbar Akali movement

I've redirected the article to Khalistan movement#Rise_of_militancy, because other incidents are hardly notable in this context. utcursch | talk 13:33, 26 December 2011 (UTC)