Reviewed by:

• Faith, Gender and Activism in the Punjab Conflict: The Wheat Fields Still Whisper by Mallika Kaur
• Andreas E. Feldmann (bio)

This excellent book examining the human rights dimension of the conflict in the Indian Punjab should be of interest to scholars, policy makers, journalists, diplomats, and practitioners. Mallika Kaur crafts an inspiring book that greatly contributes to the human rights literature by offering an innovative portrait of the forgotten and poorly understood plight of the Sikh minority. A lawyer by training, Kaur presents a poignant account of the Sikh's minority predicament. Her study unearths the nature of their struggle for human rights during the most consequential period of violence of Punjabi history, stretching from the eruption of communal violence in 1984 to the end to armed conflict in 1995.

The book documents this period by chronicling the lives of three remarkable individuals, Inderjit Singh Jaijee, a human rights defender, Justice Ajit Sing Bains, former appellate court judge, and Baljit Kaur, a homemaker, who creatively and courageously documented atrocities and fought against injustice. Their deeply [End Page 426] personal stories deftly narrated by Kaur transport the reader into in the intricate world of Indian Punjab revealing this society's divisions, tensions, and agonizing questions about national identity. The book also provides a window to gender relations of the time, underscoring the role women played in the struggle for memory and human rights. In addition, it explains the influence of the powerful Sikh diaspora in Europe and North America. Kaur furnishes a profoundly human story full of wit, poetry, and meaning that opens a fascinating window into the Sikh community, both in India and abroad. The interdisciplinary nature of the book is one of its main strengths. While eloquent and written in a powerful literary prose, the book is methodologically rigorous and draws on diverse qualitative techniques including oral history and archival research. Kaur's apt use of these techniques, coupled with her deep familiarity with the case, end up creating a robust account not only elucidating the pattern of abuse against the Sikh people, but also shedding light on this community's repertoires of resistance.

Kaur devotes significant time to explore the root sources and mechanics behind the persecution of Sikhs in Punjab. She details at length how abuses against this religious minority have been widespread and systematic and orchestrated by the Indian central government controlled by the Congress Party. The author makes clear that while violence in Punjab dates back to India's independence in 1947 and the subsequent partition of the province between the two nascent states—India and Pakistan,—a critical juncture for the conflict was the storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the most sacred Sikh shrine, by Indian Security forces in 1984. The attack, which killed thousands of people, presided over a cycle of vengeance and retaliation including the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Ghandi at the hands of her Sikh bodyguards and the explosion of communal violence against the Sikh to avenge the slaying of the charismatic politician.¹ Thousands upon thousands of Sikh were killed, injured, and displaced in what is seen as one of the most severe episodes of communal violence in the history of the country.²

Kaur shows how at the heart of the persecution of the Sikh lies a deep-seated animosity and mistrust on the part of the Indian Hindu majority, amplified by the government's resentment towards the Sikh for their open calls for autonomy, which led to unfounded accusations of their covert support of Pakistan, India's arch enemy. Through the personal stories of three protagonists who witnessed firsthand the harassment of authorities and documented abuses, Kaur conveys the complexity of human rights abuses in the Indian setting. She shows a bleak context where state-orchestrated and ethnoreligious informed communal violence feed upon one another, against the backdrop of a democratic system characterized by generalized impunity and a weak rule of law. Kaur's insights are particularly important as a contribution to the understanding of human rights deficiencies...

审核人：

• 旁遮普冲突中的信仰，性别和激进主义：麦田仍然低语by Mallika Kaur
• 安德烈亚斯·费尔德曼（生物）

这本出色的书探讨了印度旁遮普邦冲突的人权方面，这对学者，政策制定者，新闻工作者，外交官和从业人员都应该引起人们的兴趣。马利卡·考尔（Mallika Kaur）制作了一本鼓舞人心的书，通过提供有关锡克教徒少数族裔被遗忘和了解不清的困境的创新肖像，极大地促进了人权文学的发展。考尔是一名受过培训的律师，他对锡克教徒的少数民族困境发表了深刻的看法。她的研究揭示了在旁遮普历史上最重要的暴力时期（从1984年的社区暴力爆发到1995年的武装冲突结束），他们为人权而进行的斗争的性质。

该书通过记录三个杰出人物的生活来记录这一时期，他们是人权维护者Inderjit Singh Jaijee，前上诉法院法官大法官Ajit Sing Bains和家庭主妇Baljit Kaur，他们创造性地并勇敢地记录了暴行并与不公正进行了斗争。 。他们的深情[End Page 426]考尔巧妙地叙述了一些个人故事，将读者带入了印度旁遮普邦错综复杂的世界，揭示了这个社会的分裂，紧张局势以及有关民族认同的烦恼问题。该书还为了解当时的性别关系提供了一个窗口，强调了妇女在争取记忆和人权的斗争中所发挥的作用。此外，它解释了强大的锡克教徒散居者在欧洲和北美的影响。考尔（Kaur）提供了一个充满机智，诗歌和寓意的深刻人类故事，为印度和国外的锡克教徒社区打开了一个迷人的窗口。这本书的跨学科性质是其主要优势之一。虽然雄辩而有力地撰写了文学散文，这本书方法严谨，并采用了多种定性技术，包括口述历史和档案研究。考尔（Kaur）善于运用这些技术，再加上对案件的深入了解，最终形成了一个有力的解释，不仅阐明了对锡克教徒的虐待模式，而且阐明了该社区的抵抗手段。

考尔（Kaur）投入大量时间探索迫害旁遮普邦锡克教徒的根源和机制。她详细介绍了由国会党控制的印度中央政府如何广泛，系统地策划和策划针对这一宗教少数群体的虐待行为。作者明确指出，旁遮普邦的暴力事件可追溯到1947年印度独立，随后该省在两个新生国家（印度和巴基斯坦）之间划分，但冲突的一个关键时刻是冲入了阿姆利则的金庙，是印度安全部队在1984年最神圣的锡克教圣地。这次袭击造成数千人丧生，¹成千上万的锡克教徒被杀，受伤和流离失所，这被视为该国历史上最严重的社区暴力事件之一。^2个

考尔（Kaur）展示了迫害锡克教徒的核心原因是印度印度多数派成员之间根深蒂固的敌意和不信任，并因政府对锡克教徒公开呼吁自治而对锡克教徒的不满而加剧，这导致对锡克教徒的无理指责。他们暗中支持印度的主要敌人巴基斯坦。通过三位主角亲眼目睹当局骚扰并记录了虐待事件的个人故事，考尔（Kaur）传达了印度环境中侵犯人权行为的复杂性。她展示了一个凄凉的背景，在以普遍有罪不罚和法治薄弱为特征的民主制度的背景下，由国家精心策划和民族宗教的知情社区暴力相互影响。考尔