On 31 October 1984, at least 3,000 Sikhs were killed during a four-day pogrom in New Delhi. The cause of the massacre is usually cited as the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards. However, the violence did not only break out along the religious divide in the city, but also more severely affected the poorer, outer districts of Delhi. Mobs forced Sikh men onto the streets and murdered them in the most brutal manner. Many Sikh women became victims of sexualised violence. Houses were looted.
Silence and inaction
The legitimisation offered by political dignitaries, the inaction of the police and the associated prospect of impunity – a prospect that was to be realised in the years following the massacre – are what allowed the bloodbath to reach its horrifying proportions. Even over three decades later, only a tiny proportion of the perpetrators and those responsible have faced justice. Instead, the police stopped investigating hundreds of cases due to a lack of evidence.
Chaurasiye or 84ers – collective of a trauma
Preserving the memory of November 1984 and insisting on justice for its victims have therefore fallen primarily to the survivors and their descendants. One example are the numerous widows in Tilak Vihar, who were to become known by the initially negative names ‘Chaurasiye’ or 84ers – a term that developed into a new kind of collective identity for the survivors of the pogrom.
However, a specifically Indian form of multi-perspective remembrance has helped to make the traumatic experiences of these survivors more present in Indian society. This was primarily achieved by linking their experiences to the commemoration of the 1947 Partition Massacres.
In recent years, a number of feature films and documentaries have also been released on the subject of the massacre. Shonali Bose’s feature film ‘Amu’, for example, premiered at the 2005 Berlinale and was shown as the opening film of the 2006 International Women’s Film Festival in Cologne. It thus helped bring international attention to the unpunished pogrom 20 years later.
Demanding inclusion in the national culture of remembrance
For the victims, survivors, and their descendants, however, the call for justice is paramount, going beyond the mere representation of their experiences and the financial ‘compensation’ offered to them by the Indian state. Only then will there be a real chance for calm remembrance.
