Windmills in British Columbia

If Sikh separatists are a nuisance, itshould worry their host countries. Should it bother India if they keep killing their ownin gang rivalries and making their neighbourhoods unsafe?

- SHEKHAR GUPTA

How do we make the case that, while grave dangers threaten to return and old demons, buried for a generation, are stirring, it's time to call your troops back to the barracks? We are talking about Punjab and Sikhs. But hello, you might ask, where is the war? Punjab is quiet and probably more peaceful and lawful than any state in north India, definitely more than any state in the Hindi heartland. The Sikhs just voted in large numbers in state and Lok Sabha elections, dissing the almighty Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Their choice, the Aam Aadmi Party, is even more of an outsider than the BJP or the Congress.

Where is the problem, the challenge, what grave dangers are we talking about, what's stirring, and where's the war? One challenge of being in power - or more importantly, in a position of total power - is that it makes people believe they must do something with it. Inside every power system, there is a latent Don Quixote itch. You need that monstrous, malevolent windmill to tilt at, with Sancho Panza by your side. So far, so good, except it isn't a Miguel de Cervantes work from 1605. It gets more complicated when the windmill is located in British Columbia. It is the troops fighting those demons that need to be recalled to the barracks. Because the land, the people, and the politics that need attention are here. A five-and-a-half hour Vande Bharat train ride or an hour's flight from New Delhi: Amritsar.

There is no war, battle or even skirmish there. There is an unhappy, sullen and even increasingly frustrated population wanting to leave India through immigration, which will be near-impossible now.

The statements the separatists make, the abominable tableaux at their parades, the slogans, posters, and selfies with assault rifles are not India's problem. By the way, I am intrigued as to what Hardeep Singh Nijjar was conveying by posing in a saffron Banana Republic T-shirt.