Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a U.S.-based pro-Khalistan lawyer, has expressed support for Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s comments on Sikhs in India, stating that Gandhi “endorsed the SFJ’s global Khalistan Referendum campaign.”
Mr. Pannun serves as the general counsel for Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), a U.S.-based organization.
In a statement released on Wednesday, September 11, 2024 — obtained by The Hindu — Mr. Pannun described Rahul Gandhi’s remark about the “existential threat to Sikhs in India” as both bold and historically accurate.
Mr. Pannun referred to Rahul Gandhi’s address to a gathering of Indian Americans in Herndon, a Virginia suburb of Washington D.C., on Monday, September 9, 2024. During the event, Gandhi accused the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) of viewing certain religions, languages, and communities as inferior, asserting that the real fight in India is over this issue, not just politics.
In his statement, Mr. Pannun said, “While addressing the gathering in Washington D.C., where many pro-Khalistan Sikhs were present, Rahul Gandhi justified SFJ’s global Khalistan Referendum campaign when he stated, ‘The fight in India is about whether a Sikh will be allowed to wear a turban and kada, and go to the gurudwara.’”
Pannun further added, “Rahul’s statement about the ‘existential threat to Sikhs in India’ is not only bold and pioneering but also deeply rooted in the historical reality of what Sikhs have faced under successive regimes in India since 1947. It also aligns with SFJ’s position on the need for the Punjab Independence Referendum to establish the Sikh homeland, Khalistan.”
Mr. Pannun, who is wanted in India on terror charges, holds dual citizenship in the U.S. and Canada. In November of last year, U.S. federal prosecutors charged Indian national Nikhil Gupta with collaborating with an Indian government employee in a failed plot to assassinate Pannun in New York.
In response to these allegations, India formed a high-level inquiry committee to investigate the information provided by U.S. authorities regarding the plot.
