The Punjab Police and Counterinsurgency against Sikh Militants in India

Abstract

This chapter discusses the role and evolution of the Punjab Police in combatting Sikh militants in India during the bloody separatist insurgency of the 1980s and 1990s, with special attention to identifying the specific discursive, political, and institutional contexts in which local police forces become effective counterinsurgents. The Punjab Police became a more effective counterinsurgency force in the 1990s due to a successful convergence of identities, interests, and institutions. Specially, this involved coopting Sikh cultural symbols and motifs; gaining the support of the Sikh population and political elites through the compatibility of evolving interests; and effectively working with the state-level political structure and central government military forces to craft a coordinated counterinsurgent strategy. Successful counterinsurgency by local police forces is dynamic and context-sensitive, and police not only react to wider trends, but also mold those trends in ways that are advantageous for themselves and the central state.