Calling the list bearing names of overseas Sikhs forbidden from getting a visa to India 'most inhuman’, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) General Secretary Ram Madhav said in Washington that the current government has done away with the black list.
Several Non Resident Indian or NRI Sikhs have not been allowed to travel to India due to their alleged ties with separatist Khalistan movement during the 1980s and 1990s. It is believed that various Indian security agencies had prepared the blacklist, which has so far prohibited free travel to India, for those named in it.
Addressing a congregation at the Maryland Gurudwara in Washington DC this week, Mr Madhav said, "We have almost done away with the most inhuman black list, which used to deny the community their right to visit India, the right to visit Harmandir sahib, right to meet with their relatives, near and dear ones,"
He went on to add that the black list “has been almost completely removed. Only a few individuals remain (on the list). Those names will also go," he said.
Mr Madhav also told the congregation that perpetrators of the 1984 Sikh pogroms will be brought to book, saying, “Justice delayed is justice denied.”
Hear more about this and other stories which made the news in India this week, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Sochi and the establishment of a Sikh censor board.
Paramjit Sona has more – click on the audio link above to hear the full report.
