Through Bloodshed and Tears

An Afternoon In Mesa, Arizona - A Week Ago

He can remember the stench of death lingering in the air. People's voices were resonating, seeping inside of him, like screams that jump off carnival rides. They all settled into his stomach. They still live there.

Rana Singh Sodhi sits cross-legged on the floor of his restaurant in Mesa. The Guru Palace Cuisine of India had its opening ceremony only four months ago but it's doing pretty well.

Sodhi has his traditional maroon turban on. He wears a cream colored shirt with beige pants. The steel bracelet on his right wrist, the Kara, is worn to remind him that he is a follower of Guru Nanak, the founder of Sikh faith. "It's one of the 5 K's," he says while touching it. "When you're born, they slip one onto your hand and you keep it on for the rest of your life, adjusting it for size."

The five articles of Sikh faith start with the "k" alphabet in Punjabi, and are thereby referred to as the 5 K's. Lately he wears only two of the five articles, the KesKara (turban) and the Kara (bracelet).

All the customers are on the other end of the restaurant enjoying the lunch buffet at tables and chairs. But Sodhi chooses to sit in the lone private dining area where customers can sit on cushions on the floor with an authentically low table. He orders a Lassi for himself; a popular and traditional Indian drink originating from the Punjab region. It is made by blending yogurt with water, salt, pepper, ice and spices until frothy. His is also flavored with ground roasted cumin. It's a hot day in Mesa. The Lassi is refreshing.

His eyes are dark and soulful. They go back in time as he tells his tale.


The Stench

It was the year 1984. The Anti-Sikh massacre was taking place in India after the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on October 31 by her two Sikh guards.

She was assassinated out of vengeance by the two guards because four months earlier she had ordered Operation Blue Star - a military crackdown killing many Sikhs and desecrating their holy Golden Temple in Amritsar.

The guards she trusted to protect her avenged the anger and loss the Sikh community was feeling. They killed her while she was walking with them on a cemented pathway. The rows of trees on either side of them were the only witnesses to the vengeance. But following that, the nation witnessed the mass murder of thousands of Sikhs by the people of India.



How It All Began

Sodhi was the youngest of 11 siblings and grew up pampered in the small village of Passiawal, in the Kapurthal district in the province of Punjab. Punjab was and still is the farming capital of India. The family did farming and were merchants trading crops, while running a fabric shop and a general store side by side.

Sodhi recalls the violence started in 1978, when he was 15 years old. "The basic problem started with the river water. Many Sikhs believed the government was discriminating against them because more water was being supplied to other provinces, even though we were the farming state and the rivers ran through Punjab."

People believed religion was the reason for the discrimination. Local Sikh politicians started rallying up crowds. "It became a Sikh issue, and then terrorist activities started."

In response to a deterioration of order in Punjab, on June 3, 1984, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ordered Operation Blue Star to remove Sikh militants who had established a stronghold in the Golden Temple in Amritsar.

"The attack on our temple hurt every Sikh," says Sodhi, as he winces ever so slightly. "This matter could've been resolved by other ways, peaceful ways. The government could have blocked off the city, stopped the food and water supply. Instead they killed so many people, so many innocent Sikhs."

The police took young Sikh kids and jailed them. Their crime: they were Sikh. They were also shot dead, just like that. It was called an 'Encounter' when the police shot a Sikh just for being a Sikh.

"When 'Encounters' started becoming increasing common, Sikh parents felt unsafe from the government. They wanted to send their kids away to have a better life."

Things took a turn for the worse when Indira Gandhi was killed by her Sikh bodyguards. People were outraged and mobs of non-Sikhs starting a Sikh-killing rampage. "There were riots in every city and Sikhs were not protected by anybody - not by the government, not by the law enforcement. The law enforcement took part in killing Sikhs."

Sodhi was nearly 20 then and witnessed all of it. "It was horrible. Everybody was crying listening to the radio, watching the TV; the whole village got together and cried. I cried. I remember the pain. All the Sikhs wanted to leave India at that time. There was no security."



Sodhi finishes his Lassi and puts the glass down on the table. "How do you feel secure when the people who are supposed to protect you are killing you?"



He pauses.



"This happened in 1984. This didn't happen a hundred years ago." It was in fact just 24 years ago.



"After 1984 most Sikhs moved away from Punjab. They moved to America, Canada, Germany, and England…" And that's what Sodhi and his brothers did, one by one to pursue their American Dream of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.


Epilogue: Irony - An Afternoon In Mesa, Arizona, 7 Years Ago



Four days after 9/11, Balbir Sodhi - Rana Sodhi's older brother - was with a landscaper making tree and flower arrangements at his gas station in Mesa when an enraged Frank Roque shot him dead. Roque was on a rampage to kill anyone he thought was Arab-American.

Roque was sentenced to death on Sept. 30, 2003 but later the Arizona Supreme Court changed it to life in prison because of substantial mitigating evidence of mental illness.

10 months later Rana's other brother, Sukhpal Sodhi, was shot in the neck while driving his cab in San Francisco. He died on the spot; the cab lost control, crashed and blew up into flames. The police stated the murder was not a hate crime; however the murderer has yet to be found or questioned.