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Margaret Thatcher wanted to prosecute Sikh who incited Indira Gandhi's killing
Highlights
Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher wanted to take legal action against a UK-based Sikh separatist leader accused of inciting Indira Gandhi’s assassination, but failed to comply with India’s request to deport him due to British law towards Commonwealth citizens, newly-declassified documents released on Thursday revealed.
Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher wanted to take legal action against a UK-based Sikh separatist leader accused of inciting Indira Gandhi’s assassination, but failed to comply with India’s request to deport him due to British law towards Commonwealth citizens, newly-declassified documents released on Thursday revealed.
Jagjit Singh Chauhan, the founder of the Khalistan movement, had moved to Britain in 1971 to carry on his campaign for an independent Sikh state in India.
He is believed to be the chief instigator behind the assassination of the then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on October 31, 1984, predicting months before in a BBC interview her death at the hands of her Sikh bodyguard, saying Gandhi and family would be “beheaded” as revenge for Operation Bluestar, the raid on the Golden Temple in June, 1984.
Now documents released under the 30-year declassification rule by the UK’s National Archives in Kew, southwest London, highlight the Thatcher government’s failed attempts at curbing his activities.
Her private secretary Charles Powell wrote to the UK home office: “She (Thatcher) does not see how Chauhan can evade the charge of inciting to violence simply by saying he is not doing so... The Prime Minister is of the view that the law officers might with advantage study the papers once more.”
“The Indians formally requested the deportation of Chauhan on March 4, 1976 on the grounds of anti-Indian activities... We could not comply with the request because it ran counter to British law and policies towards Commonwealth citizens,” Sir Geoffrey Howe, foreign secretary in the Thatcher Cabinet, wrote in apparent explanation over her concerns about Chauhan’s presence in the UK. “In theory, Chauhan could also be excluded or deported at the discretion of the home secretary... But this action could only be taken if, amongst other factors, there was concrete evidence that he had engaged in very serious criminal activities,” he added.
Chauhan had received an official warning that his outbursts must remain within the bounds of the law, but the UK government failed to take legal action due to lack of any “concrete evidence.”
The documents released on Thursday include a personal intervention by Thatcher to demand that the BBC be wary of giving Chauhan unrestricted air-time. “The home office has already had occasion to draw to your attention the government’s concern about the platform which the BBC has provided for a small minority of Sikh extremists in this country,” she wrote to then BBC director-general Stuart Young in the lead up to Indira Gandhi’s funeral in New Delhi.
“We now have specific advice from our high commissioner that this is not only damaging our relations with India, but endangering the security of British citizens in India, and more specifically the threat to Her Royal Highness Princess Anne and others going to Delhi for Mrs Gandhi’s funeral,” she wrote.
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