THE WAY WE FOUGHT FOR OUR RIGHTS
A decade and seven years ago, six Sikkimese representing the three ethnic communities of Sikkim – Lepchas, Bhutias and Nepalese – held a 12-hour hunger strike in Gangtok on October 2, 1999, demanding restoration of their political rights on seat reservation in the Sikkim Legislative Assembly.
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| (Left to Right) Tenzing Namgyal, Jigme N. Kazi, Nima Lepcha, Pintso Bhutia, K.C. Pradhan and Gyamsay Bhutia. |
The participants were: the Late K.C. Pradhan, former Minister and Advisor of the Sikkimese Nepalese Apex Committee (SNAC), Nima Lepcha and Pintso Bhutia, Convenors of the Sikkim Bhutia-Lepcha Apex Committee (SIBLAC), Jigme N. Kazi, Chairman of the Organisation of Sikkimese Unity (OSU), and Tenzing Namgyal and Gyamsay Bhutia of the SIBLAC.
The protestors “sought the blessing of the ‘Father of the Nation’ and the Guardian Deities of Sikkim in their struggle on restoration of their political rights” as reflected in Article 371F of the Constitution of India.
“We held the hunger strike on October 2 to remind the world that we were determined to struggle on till our demand on restoration of our political rights were met. While others fought the elections we fought for our people. We are not concerned with who wins or loses in the polls; our main concern was that if the Assembly seats were not restored to us in the near future we would be the ultimate losers and the electoral process would then become a meaningless ritual as the Sikkimese people would have no future to look forward to.”
Ref: The Lone Warrior: Exiled In My Homeland, by Jigme N. Kazi, published by Hill Media Publications, Gangtok, 2014.