‘It was height of brutality’

‘It was height of brutality’
Rajay Deep
Tribune News Service

Bathinda, February 21
“The pain in my arm and the head due to the lathi blows rained by the rioters reminds me of the bloodshed and arson that took place on November 2, 1984,” said 70-year-old Jaswant Kaur, who survived the anti-Sikh massacre at Hond Chillar village in Rewari district of Haryana.
Failing to control her tears, Jaswant Kaur said in a feeble voice, “I was in the streets when a truck reached there at about 11 am and dozens of men jumped out of it. They were so menacing that we rushed inside our haveli.”
“When they did not enter our house till 2 pm, we thought things had settled down. But we were wrong. Within minutes, armed with lathis, the rioters attacked our houses. Frightened, we locked ourselves inside the rooms. When they failed to break open the doors, they drilled holes in the roof and started pouring diesel and kerosene inside and set the rooms on fire. Feeling suffocated, we rushed outside and the rioters attacked us,” said Jaswant Kaur.
“The bloody episode lasted for a couple of hours in which about 32 persons, all our relatives except for an Army man, who had come for shelter in the village, were killed. It was the height of brutality when 12 members of Gurdial Singh’s family, who had locked themselves up in a room, were set ablaze by the rioters by setting the room on fire. The number could have gone higher but a blast took place in the fuel tank of a tractor that led them to think that some of us had bombs and they fled,” recalled her husband Uttam Singh.
When asked if they would like to settle down again in their village, the couple refused saying, “The bloodshed we witnessed there will not allow us even a single night’s sleep.
I wish the government books the guilty and builds a memorial to those killed there during the riots,” demanded Uttam Singh.