Sikhs in Vienna
Upper Caste fundamentalist's attack lower caste gurdwara and kill Sikh preacher. This caused riots in Punjab.
May 25 (Bloomberg) -- Police opened fire in India’s Punjab state and authorities imposed curfews to quell violent protests by Sikhs angered by the death of a preacher in the Austrian capital, Vienna.
Demonstrators blocked roads, set trains ablaze and torched buses in several towns in Punjab and neighboring Haryana state. Troops patrolled streets in Jalandhar district, Gurmit Singh, a Punjab state police official, said by phone. Two people died in separate incidents in the state as police opened fire, Press Trust of India reported.
“Everything is under control now,” Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal said in comments made to the Times Now television channel.
The violence was triggered by the death of visiting Indian preacher Sant Rama Anand, 57, shot during a brawl between rival Sikhs at a temple in Vienna’s Rudolfsheim-Fuenfhaus district yesterday.
Anand had been preaching in the temple, and died shortly after midnight from injuries to the abdomen and back, Vienna police spokesman Michael Takacs said. A second preacher, Sant Niranjan Dass, 66, was in stable condition after being struck by two bullets, he said.
“We’re working under the hypothesis that the content of the sermon prompted the attack and that it wasn’t premeditated,” the spokesman said.
Knives, Pistol
Six men from a rival Sikh temple had drawn 20-centimeter (eight-inch) knives and a pistol at about 1:30 p.m. during a ceremony attended by about 200 people. Four of the attackers sustained serious injuries and remain hospitalized, Takacs said. The other two are in jail.
The attackers were known within Vienna’s Sikh community as fundamentalists, according to the police. The four-year-old temple where the attack occurred had been accused of ignoring Sikh traditions.
As protests spread in Punjab, curfews were imposed in Ludhiana, Phagwara and Hoshiarpur towns. Trains to Punjab are being stopped at some stations and diverted, CNN-IBN television channel reported.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, a Sikh, appealed to people to remain calm.
“Sikhism preaches tolerance and harmony,” Singh said in a statement in New Delhi today. “Whatever the provocation, it is important to maintain peace and harmony among different sections of the people.”
India was “worried and concerned” by what happened in Vienna and is in touch with the Austrian government, Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna said.
Bharti Wal-Mart delayed the start of its joint-venture cash-and-carry wholesale store “due to the situation in Punjab,” it said in a release. The company had planned to open the outlet tomorrow in the city of Amritsar.
May 25 (Bloomberg) -- Police opened fire in India’s Punjab state and authorities imposed curfews to quell violent protests by Sikhs angered by the death of a preacher in the Austrian capital, Vienna.
Demonstrators blocked roads, set trains ablaze and torched buses in several towns in Punjab and neighboring Haryana state. Troops patrolled streets in Jalandhar district, Gurmit Singh, a Punjab state police official, said by phone. Two people died in separate incidents in the state as police opened fire, Press Trust of India reported.
“Everything is under control now,” Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal said in comments made to the Times Now television channel.
The violence was triggered by the death of visiting Indian preacher Sant Rama Anand, 57, shot during a brawl between rival Sikhs at a temple in Vienna’s Rudolfsheim-Fuenfhaus district yesterday.
Anand had been preaching in the temple, and died shortly after midnight from injuries to the abdomen and back, Vienna police spokesman Michael Takacs said. A second preacher, Sant Niranjan Dass, 66, was in stable condition after being struck by two bullets, he said.
“We’re working under the hypothesis that the content of the sermon prompted the attack and that it wasn’t premeditated,” the spokesman said.
Knives, Pistol
Six men from a rival Sikh temple had drawn 20-centimeter (eight-inch) knives and a pistol at about 1:30 p.m. during a ceremony attended by about 200 people. Four of the attackers sustained serious injuries and remain hospitalized, Takacs said. The other two are in jail.
The attackers were known within Vienna’s Sikh community as fundamentalists, according to the police. The four-year-old temple where the attack occurred had been accused of ignoring Sikh traditions.
As protests spread in Punjab, curfews were imposed in Ludhiana, Phagwara and Hoshiarpur towns. Trains to Punjab are being stopped at some stations and diverted, CNN-IBN television channel reported.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, a Sikh, appealed to people to remain calm.
“Sikhism preaches tolerance and harmony,” Singh said in a statement in New Delhi today. “Whatever the provocation, it is important to maintain peace and harmony among different sections of the people.”
India was “worried and concerned” by what happened in Vienna and is in touch with the Austrian government, Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna said.
Bharti Wal-Mart delayed the start of its joint-venture cash-and-carry wholesale store “due to the situation in Punjab,” it said in a release. The company had planned to open the outlet tomorrow in the city of Amritsar.
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