In the News
Trauma and Testimony in Digital Times, The Wire, May 21, 2016
New Delhi: Fourteen-year-old Manpreet Kaur, now aged 45, was returning home after a medical check-up when she saw her neighbourhood Gurudwara go up in flames in East Delhi’s Trilokpuri area. Armed with knives and kerosene cans, angry mobs thronged the streets and attacked houses. Kaur took refuge in a nondescript alley to save her life, crouching behind a crumbling wall. Her story is just one among the several thousand that emerged during the massacred which followed the assassination of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on October 31, 1984.
Three decades later, a digital initiative is mapping the stories of a community still plagued by a deep sense of denial of justice…More at: http://thewire.in/2016/05/
Portland-area Sikhs share their stories of November 1984 anti-Sikh violence, The Oregonian, November 2, 2015
Thirty-one years ago, violence wracked Sikh communities in India. Thousands died at the hands of their Hindu countrymen.
Today, some surviving Sikhs live in the Portland-area. Thanks to 1984 Living History, a nonprofit project collecting Sikh’s memories of the killings, we’re sharing their stories in honor of the anniversary….More at: http://www.oregonlive.com/
June 1984: 31 Years Later, Sikhs Are Mapping Their Stories, Kafila, June 9, 2015
Thirty-one years later, deep-rooted hegemonic silences remain in place. Personal and collective histories have been largely unaddressed by the official historical record.
But, tied to millennial Sikh spirit, this project is not about victimhood. It is about voice and resilience. It is about honoring the agency of suppressed communities to tell their stories in the face of a machinery that has silenced them.
It is very easy to suggest that “moving on” from the trauma of that massacre is as easy as..Read More…
Reliving the 1984 Sikh Killings: What the Media Couldn’t Tell You 31 Years Ago, Youth Ki Awaaz, June 7, 2015
Sikhs are realizing that it was not only their sacred grounds that were hijacked – so was their narrative as a community and moreover, their ability to stand stronger with others at risk of similar violence.
Sikh youth whose parents and grandparents lived through that year inherit a silence that has set in, born of the deep betrayal experienced at the hands of their own government. Read More…
1984 Living History Project featured on Punjabi Radio USA , June 3, 2015.
A Sikh Millenial’s Take On Remembering The Forgotten, November 14, 2014
Like with too many other people, the year 1984 meant nothing to me back in 2009. Or, to be perfectly honest, it only invoked Orwell. So, that 25th anniversary of 1984 came and went, leaving me generally unfazed. Read More..
As Stories Turn 30, 1984 Living History Project Gains Momentum. The Scribber
“Stories about the 1984 violence across India are often only told quietly in Sikh homes and behind closed doors, whereas only a selective narrative makes the headlines. Especially when stories of trauma have been diligently wrapped in blame and fear for over three decades, they are seldom publically accessible. This Project is changing that reality: one video narrative at a time.”Read More..
1984 Living History Project ~ Volunteers Speak, SikhNet, October 8, 2014.
“I saw this as an opportunity to participate in a project that was beneficial and was helping teach others about what really happened in 1984. I had never done anything like this before hand, but it was, in all honesty, relatively simple work that would help tell a bigger story for years and years to come.”
“The Kaurs of 1984,” Kaur Life, September 30, 2014.
In the past, men exclusively occupied the “public” or “political” spheres of life, whereas women exclusively occupied the “private” or “domestic” spheres of life and thus men may have felt that women did not contribute to important events. So, men ignored them when writing history. But the 1984 Living History Project is doing something different. They are honoring the lives of both Sikh men and women. Read More..
“1984 Living History Project,” Sikh Activist Network, September 8, 2014.
Some of us think that 30 years is a long time. That, sitting in the diaspora, June 1984 is something that happened in a distant world to “extremists” that entered Harmandir Sahib, Amritsar. That the pogroms of November 1984 were riots that only affected the Sikhs of Delhi as a reaction of the assassination of Indira Gandhi. We believe these things because that is what the media wants us to believe. It is the only narrative that is allowed to exist in the mainstream. Read More...
“Before you guys came I was talking to my son about what we were going to talk about, and I’ve never had an opportunity before to do that with him…for that I want to thank you.”Read More…
Call To Submit Your Video for the 1984 Living History Project. Sikh 24. August 24, 2014.
“After having suffered immense physical and mental pain and distress, the Sikh community seems to have finally opened up about talking about the wounds caused during the 1984 anti-Sikh pogroms in India.”
Where Were You in 1984? The 1984 Living History Project, SikhChic, May 19, 2014.
“My grandfather, who cremated his young son and throughout his life kept his son’s memory alive, is no more. With his passing, we lost the opportunity to record an experience very valuable to all of us. Now, my mother and grandmother have given their interviews for the Project, and I am inspired by their strength. I have in turn gone and interviewed absolute strangers, feeling stronger and more informed myself with each interview.”