Extrajudicial Executions in the Punjab

In the late 1970's and 1980's the Khalistan movement sought to establish a Sikh state in the Punjab region of India. This movement was often violent and was met in turn by violence from the Indian government. During the 1980's and 1990's the Khalistan movement and the Indian military & police both used excessive violence. Violence which led to numerous deaths on both sides.

It is believed that over 5,000 Sikhs were the victims of "enforced disappearances and extrajudicial executions" by the Indian government's counterinsurgency measures during the 1980's & 1990's. Ensaaf's Crimes Against Humanity project is an attempt to document and map these disappearances and executions by the Indian security forces in the state of Punjab. The data was gathered from a village-by-village census project interviewing victim's families and examining documentary evidence.

The Crimes Against Humanity interactive map plots where Sikhs disappeared or were killed in the Punjab as a result of the Indian government's counterinsurgency. The interactive map includes a timeline which allows you to see when these disappearances took place. The markers on the map are scaled to reflect the number of victims documented at each location. You can click on these markers to learn more about each of the individual victims and the nature of their disappearance or killing.