‘….what happened in 1984 was the negation of the concept of nationhood enshrined in our constitution, stated the then PM Manmohan Singh in the Rajya Sabha on August 11, 2005.
People in India are contemplating the impact of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s service to the nation following his passing on Thursday night.
Singh, who occupied the highest position for two successive terms from 2004 to 2014, was regarded as a key figure in India’s economic liberalisation that altered the nation’s growth path.
Singh was the first prime minister to regain power since Jawaharlal Nehru and also the first Sikh to hold the highest position.
Regarded as a mild-mannered technocrat, he previously led India’s central bank, held the positions of finance secretary and minister, and spearheaded the opposition in the upper chamber of parliament.
Dr Manmohan Singh’s apology
In 1984, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was murdered by her Sikh bodyguards as revenge for a military operation she had commanded against separatists concealed in Sikhism’s most sacred temple located in Amritsar, northern India.
Her passing triggered extensive violence that led to the death of over 3,000 Sikhs and significant destruction of their belongings.
In 2005, Singh officially apologized to the country in parliament, stating that the violence was “the negation of the concept of nationhood enshrined in our constitution.”
“I have no hesitation in apologising to the Sikh community. I apologise not only to the Sikh community, but to the whole Indian nation,” he said.
No other prime minister, especially from the Congress party, has gone this far to apologize in parliament for the riots.
The traumatized Sikh community awaited decades for an apology concerning the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, which took place during Congress governance and were provoked by certain party leaders.
The following day, Robert O’Blake, Deputy Chief of Mission at the American Embassy in New Delhi, remarked that Manmohan Singh accomplished “what no Indian leader has dared to do in the past 20 years.”
“I have no hesitation in apologising to the Sikh community. I apologise not only to the Sikh community, but to the whole Indian nation because what took place in 1984 is the negation of the concept of nationhood enshrined in our Constitution,” he stated on August 11, 2005, in an address characterized by honesty and remorse.
