Dilawar Singh Babbar - Assassination of Beant Singh

Assassination of Beant Singh

In Punjab between 1992 and 1995, at a time when the Khalistan separatist movement was active in the state and the Indian government was aggressively seeking to control the movement. It is alleged that, during Beant Singh's tenure, upwards of twenty-five thousand of Sikh civilians were disappeared and killed and their bodies cremated by the police in extrajudicial executions. As per Asian Human Rights Commission, "Government under Chief Minister Beant Singh created a situation where even subordinate police officers became the judge, jury and executioner of innocent people. Sikh boys were picked up from their houses or fields and taken blindfolded to isolated places and told to run. A burst of AK-47 rifle-fire ended their lives." Dilawar Singh, who was a police constable at that time, conspired with Balwant Singh Rajoana, a police officer, to kill Beant Singh. Based on a coin toss, Dilawar was chosen to be the suicide bomber with Rajoana as a backup. The attack on 31 August 1995 resulted in the death of Beant Singh, Dilawar Singh and 17 others, and, on 25 December 1997, backup police officer Rajoana confessed his involvement while blaming Indian government that it has murders its own people and promoted and honored the killers of Sikhs, its Chief Minister Beant Singh had licensed fake encounter killings, abductions, and secret cremations which remained unpunished to date', refused to contest the court proceedings and death penalty awarded to him.