To begin with there is an interesting distinction made by the author between the concept of Khalistan pre-partition and the post-independence demands by Sikhs in the 1980s. I, too, will be separating these terms in this review, denoting each with an [a] for pre-partition and a [b] for the latter. However, personally I believe that both conceptions were similarly ill defined and lacking any meaningful details in terms of an actual economic framework and governance structure1. Instead, they were/are both demands from desperation and as a last resort. However, both opportunities given to the Indian government by Sikhs to secure their freedoms and rights as equals have been ignored and even violated by the government itself.
What is also interesting is the evolution of demands from Khalistan[a], to Azad Punjab, Sikhistan etc and eventually the East Punjab we have today. It’s important to highlight the point made in the first chapter. There was no desire for a separate state of Khalistan[a] at that point, it was merely a strategy to make it more difficult for Jinnah and act as an obstacle for the formation of Pakistan. The Azad Punjab strategy was a good lesson in how important optics are. As a proposal it was opposed for its connotations not necessarily its contents it seems. Nonetheless, the development of these ideas through things like Sikhistan as autonomous regions just highlighted the sheer scale of what was going on at the time and how it defined the globe today. I believe that the author's argument that none of these were a serious call for a separate Sikh nation, is a strong one. Rather they were strategies to help keep a unified sub-continent. So given all this, was the decision by the Sikh leadership at the time correct to not demand a separate state seriously from the start? I believe yes and no.
Given the seemingly lack of attention and even information available around sound economics during that period and the types of governance systems that were prevalent and pushed onto these colonies, I fail to see how a separate Sikh homeland established at that time wouldn’t have just been a Khalsa-themed “republic”, no different to the Muslim-themed Pakistan and Hindu-themed India of today. Both of which suffered from the same broken ideas of central planning and state overreach in their economies thereby stunting their growth and perpetuating poverty for decades unnecessarily. At the same time, the actual religiosity behind their “themes” became watered down, ultra-nationalised versions of their respective spiritual traditions preceding them. By this time, Sikhi had already gone through its own reform movement via the Singh Sabha efforts to distil Sikhi and make it fit into the post-colonial worldview of “religion”. Given the situation, it was arguably understandable the motivations behind some of the reformers.
The only reason I would see a separate nation or province as a viable solution is if the plan for it would be based on an Azadist model. This would have essentially created a “special economic zone” in the region not too dissimilar to how Hong Kong or even Singapore was. However, I see no evidence of Azadist thought prevalent amongst Sikh leadership at that time who would be willing to implement this2. Hence, all our efforts went into trying to prevent the formation of Pakistan and splitting up the land. Which is reasonable given the accurate foresight of the Sikh leadership who knew what this meant in reality in terms of the mass death and destruction.
The whole idea of populations determining dominance over regions is a direct result of the “democratic” systems the British set. The invaders defined the games, and we all (Sikhs, Muslims and Hindus) went along with it without stopping to think; maybe this mob-rule mentality isn't the best way to safeguard the rights and freedoms of everyone, especially minorities. Instead, the Imperialists crafted a game that whichever shepherd herds the most sheep shall be given the right to take lands and rule. The shepherds: Gandhi, Nehru, and Jinnah were the winners of this game and the losers were millions of lives lost and displaced. For this reason, the hesitancy of the Sikh leadership to establish their own nation-state, I believe, was the correct attitude. They rejected this rush to set up post-colonial conceptions of modern nation-states since the whole idea of a Muslim nation, a Hindu nation, or nations split into religious lines at all seems to be antithetical to Sikhi entirely. The Guru’s darbars were open to all, and they were unifiers of people and defenders of their rights. Whereas this game was one of divide and conquer.
Although we can’t really go back in time, it may be useful to see what an Azadist policy would look like if it was employed at the end of the British occupation of India.
A constitution based on the Azadist Manifesto would be designed that guaranteed the religious freedoms of all. There would be no justification for each community carving up the land based on religion. Instead, a new government would be established that is limited in influence and scope. Rejecting a party-based system, the nation would be governed by constitutional law where politicians have no right to legislate away fundamental rights. The government’s role then would be restricted to ensure adherence to that constitution. However, crucially, that constitution would also be limited to a few fundamental principles and policies too. The main one being the Non-Aggression Principle (NAP). This is the right for every individual to live however they want, as long as it does not impede the right for others to do the same. This naturally implies that property rights for every individual must be upheld as an utmost priority. No individual, no matter how much a majority forms against them, would have to move or abandon their possessions nor the land they own as it would violate the fundamentals of the constitutionally based NAP protection they are entitled to. This means all forms of social organisation would have to be formed and participated in on a voluntary basis. This would be the new government's sole responsibility.
As an extension of this, instead of the central planning and socialist policies that Nehru implemented, the nation's economy would be left free to develop naturally as a free and fair market. A Free-market naturally implies a system of voluntary transactions between suppliers and consumers, however, I highlight the term “Fair-market” in particular as it entails that no supplier or consumer can appeal to the state authority to gain special advantages over their competition. This manifests itself as a complete ban on corporate political activity and lobbying in particular. This would be clearly solidified in the constitution and criminalised as bribery. This would prevent monopoly formation whilst promoting wealth creation amongst the population as well as investment (domestic and foreign).
As for the religious communities who choose to organise, they can govern themselves through contracts in which parties can voluntarily participate in3. This is not land bound and would grant no jurisdiction over any area arbitrarily unless they own it through purchasing it off existing residents. This way, minority communities are not sidelined because they did not have enough babies to justify new nations. Instead, the same rights are guaranteed to all by the constitution, and then people are free to live how they want (provided they do not impede the right for others to do the same) under that. If someone didn’t want to join one of these, then they would be free not to and protected under the constitution to do so. This allows both power-hungry demagogues and genuine community leaders to channel their desires and establish their own private townships and city states, just like our Gurus did. They can experiment with different central planning strategies like how businesses do today,, but instead of forcing everyone into these, they must either buy and develop on empty land or existing areas that have voluntarily chosen to participate or sell them their property. Instead of a tax, they collect fees or rents in return for their services and living on their legally (and morally) attained property, or even opt for a dasvandh-based approach.
The critical element of all this is choice and the freedom to participate or deny membership at each individual's own will. There is no pressure to conform to a national standard like a “Pakistan” or “Hindustan”. Instead, the pressure is on the community leadership or private/voluntary micro-governments to convince people to migrate to their projects. Just like any private enterprise, if they want something, they must offer something of value that people want. In this case, that's a good quality of life and security. There is no need for parties and democracies since people's rights in this system are not up for discussion. People can vote with their money on which project or community (or none at all) they would like to join without the threat of displacement. Their rights are fundamental, as defined by the constitution. No matter how many votes someone gets, it does not justify the removal of these rights.
For example, if Socialist or Communist types want a commune, then they can come together, pool funds and buy some land to set it up. Instead of Jinnah convincing the British to give him and his party jurisdiction over large areas, in the process disregarding the private property of all the residents within it, he would instead have to go and buy that land by convincing people to sell it to him and his party. This is an alternative to what we got, where the Imperialists carved up the land and granted the new centralised governments the right to acquire funds through the threat of force (taxes) and centrally plan the economy through these stolen funds. Thereby, giving everyone no choice but to hope the central planners get it right… which they didn’t.
In accordance with the position taken by the Sikh leadership at the time, “vivisection” of India would be rejected. All fears of religious minorities and majorities would be mitigated by a government that has very little power to do much in the first place. No one community can be given privileges or suppressed when the state’s remit is restricted to just four things:
(Even these can be decentralised over time)
If you are already familiar with this work, it may seem antithetical to Azadism to support a “one and indivisible” India since decentralisation is such an important aspect of Azadist thinking. However, centralisation is only opposed when centralising the nation into a homogenous unit bound by a large bureaucratic government that has overwhelming regulatory power. Instead, Azadism would like India (including Pakistan, and even the whole world ideally) to be under one constitution based upon Azadist principles of maintaining property rights for every individual and the guarantee to be protected under the NAP. That’s it. Actual governance over economic activity would be out of the central government's hands and would rely solely on the market interactions of the people themselves. I.e the people freely, fairly and voluntarily interacting/trading/transacting with each other. There is no need for different ministers speaking for our behalf, or departments establishing trade deals etc. People trade with people. Government needs to get out of the way. The only role it needs to play is stepping in when a particular trade breaches the NAP (e.g. slave trade).
Hence one indivisible India would be one land mass operating in a decentralised way, where power is spread out amongst the people, rather than concentrated in the government and parties. What we got instead, were two new highly centralised units, each with power concentrated in their respective governments. The kind of rights Azadism promotes were not guaranteed by either of these new nations, and the people suffered immensely from poor central planning, terrorism and wars, and both cultural and physical genocide. In a way, one and indivisible “India '' would have been a nation of a billion nations within it, where every house was a kingdom, and each individual was their own monarch who governed over their own property freely. If people chose to aggregate and pool resources together then they would be more than free as long as all participating were doing so and using their own privately owned property. This wouldn’t even have to be restricted on religious lines, many villages pre-partition weren’t either.
Under Azadism, the central government wouldn’t be a means to get rich and powerful by manipulating the economy as politics would be separated from money entirely. If anything, it would be a burdensome responsibility. The Khalsa could have satisfied this role as a servant of the people and protector of rights for everyone. The demagogues Jinnah, Nehru and Gandhi have the blood of millions on their hands in their quest for power and greed.
Therefore, drawing upon the great Shakti that is “hindsight”, if I was in a position back then and participated in the negotiations, I too would have advocated against dividing India and having a separate state for Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs. Instead, I would have promoted Azadism and drafted up a constitution that could be implemented in a unified, yet decentralised sub-continent. This may have even appealed to the British as they (alongside other parts of the West) also began to operate their own economies more in this way and would have gained a prosperous trading partner. They were just slow and inefficient in their own patchy adoption of these principles, and it would have been a great opportunity for the ex-colony to supersede its former invader economically. Hence why I am saying, everything that is being done through outlining Azadism today should have been done ages ago by people far greater and with way more knowledge than I.
Lastly, a few points to highlight from Jaskanwar Singh’s dissertation before we conclude. I would like to reiterate that the Sikh leadership demand was at heart primarily encapsulated by this quote Singh uses to open Chapter One:
The important bit here isn’t the geography and borders, it's the freedom. The land area is merely there to facilitate this and provide a platform for this to be expressed. However, in the rush to found new nations and manipulate communities into blind nationalism, freedom and human liberty are sidelined. Individualism is rejected as the sheep rush to satisfy the collectivist ideal.
Even Sant Jarnail Singh Khalsa Bhindranwale was primarily active to reform, not seceding from India unless as a last resort. Why didn’t he advocate for Khalistan[b] from the start? Was it because he had some faith in the same government that lied to us? No. I believe this is because the whole idea of creating new nation-states just plays into the game that the Imperialists set. The issue isn’t the borders, it's the laws and institutions in place within them. Hence the Anandpur Sahib Resolution was the demand of the Dharam Yudh Morcha. Running away and isolating ourselves from authoritarianism so that we can experiment with our own version of the same thing isn’t a solution. Khalsa here is to fight tyranny through a variety of means, not let it fester in foreign nations and pretend it’s not our problem because there's a border now separating us. And especially not to form our own versions of the same thing.
As Jaskanwar Singh mentions in his conclusion “As there was no explicit plan for this state [Khalistan[a]], this was presented to cripple the idea of Pakistan”, the more modern conceptions of Khalistan[b] today similarly has no plan. However, the difference today is that the push for it is mostly emotional and lacks any strategic aim. We were not ready for a nation then in the 1940s, and I really don’t think we are now. If one was to be set up today, after hearing the rhetoric of modern-day Neo-Khalistanis[b], it would likely be a socialist hellhole with an authoritarian government trying to impose a literalist and distilled version of Sikhi on everyone, indirectly and directly. I doubt it would even last that long if we employed the leadership skills currently in the Panth.
That is… until now! The whole point of this Azadism project is to remedy exactly this. It is to fill in these details and provide a long-term solution. The Azadist Manifesto hopes to inform a potential future constitution or even reform the constitutions of existing nations in a far more rational way. There is no pride taken in any of this work, in fact, there is a shame. The contents of this Manifesto should have been worked out and strategised decades before the 1940s, perhaps even a century before. We Sikhs today are unbelievably behind, and this delay is what left us unprepared for 1947 despite the great efforts of the leadership of the time. However, today, those who claim to represent the Panth do not even have an ounce of the same character. When presenting them with Azadism and inviting them to engage and rinse these ideas (late as we already are), it is ignored and sometimes even suppressed. Why? Because it is far easier to say you want Azaadi, than actually want Azaadi.
This Manifesto is just the start, and authors like Jaskanwar Singh and others who have come forward to engage in this subject matter are spearheading a new way of looking at how to effectively work towards Azaadi outside of just sign-making and marches. A really good movie or TV show could be made about this, designed for all audiences not just Sikhs. This would highlight how badly Sikhs were sidelined in the build-up to 1947 and reveal the reality of themes such as nationalism, colonialism and central planning. NSYF has recently proven how good production value has gotten on Parchar of Panthic topics, these things are not unobtainable. They just need focus.
Lastly, efforts like this are great and much blessing is given to Jaskanwar Singh to explore these areas of our history and uncover not just the chronology of events, but attitudes, motivations and strategies of Sikhs in the past. Instead of reading it and filing it away as just interesting history, this must be used to help inform our present day perspectives and the nature of our future demands and efforts.
1 Key word here is “meaningful”. Whilst there were indeed some limited efforts in this regard, documentation around this does not appear well thought out at all in terms of reconciling Sikhi & Khalsa values with actual economics and statecraft. Rather, what we see when examining some of the limited resources we have on this tends to be lacking sufficient detail and even self-contradictory in places. It seems as though those efforts were made purely to have at least something and the details can be figured out later after a state is established. This type of thinking isn’t one Azadism approaches these topics with and much prefers foresight in these matters. It is nations we are doing vichaar on after all. Starting a business without a solid business plan is a recipe for disaster, and aiming to establish a nation on a similar notion results in even worse tragedies. Obviously, thanks to the sacrifices of our Shaheeds, we are in a position to do this far more freely and outside such a state of desperation unlike the authors of those documents. I will do a more detailed analysis of these in future elsewhere.
2 Obviously it didn’t exist, but the economic principles behind Azadism did exist albeit less well known. In the East we were still used to different forms of Feudalism. However, applying the liberty aspects of Khalsa Mat would naturally lead you to the necessary conclusions anyway. We just didn’t have any of that written down and mapped out in detail as to how it could be applied to operate a state and draft a constitution in this light. That has only come now through the Azadist Manifesto. Unfortunately, over a hundred years too late.
3 For a more detailed explanation of this system, see Section V - The Role of Government of the Azadsist Manifesto. Heading “Contracts and Law” – The Role of Government (azadism.co.uk)