1984
The Man in The Orange Turban:
Basel, Switzerland
DAVID
There is only one public employee in Basel, Switzerland, who wears a turban.
As a now 59 years old Sikh, Dalip Singh Khalsa, from India, fled to Switzerland in 1995, after serving a prison sentence for hijacking an airliner in July 1984, when Sikhs demanded independence from India.
Together with other students, they hijacked an Air India A300 with 264 passengers and crew aboard to Lahore (Pakistan).
Dalip Singh was sentenced to death.
Several of his accomplices were executed, but after being pardoned by Pakistan's Premier Benazir Bhutto, Dalip Singh went to Switzerland, fearing India's broken "justice system" if he returned home, even though it meant he would never see his family again.
He lived and worked in Basel, cleaning roads, sidewalks and public places, until 2008, when the authorities revoked his permit, saying he didn't deserve his temporary refugee status.
Only then it was revealed that he had hijacked an aircraft 24 years ago.
But by then, the man with the orange turban and his orange work clothes had turned into a somebody who would be missed by the population of Basel.
A huge wave of support began, and nobody wanted to see the friendly man go back to India, and in 2010, the authorities granted him a permanent staying permit, and he continues to work for the city cleaning service.
After 17 years of separation, his wife got a permit to visit him for three months. Technically, he and his wife are still married, but as the documents cannot be retrieved in India even in the best of times and circumstances, Dalip Singh can neither prove being married, or being not married, and so the courts try to find a solution for a marriage in Switzerland.
[Courtesy: Airliners]
January 28, 2013
Conversation about this article
1: Sandeep Singh Brar (Canada), January 28, 2013, 9:54 AM.
The article does not mention that he spent 8 long years in jail in Pakistan before his release.
2: H. Kaur (Canada), January 29, 2013, 1:56 AM.
The article also doesn't mention that a few years earlier two Hindu men hijacked a plane ... with the approval of the Indira Gandhi government, because it helped trigger the Bangla-Desh War and led to the dismemberment of Pakistan ... and were given tickets to the Indian parliament! What kind of a precedent does that set to people about hijacking planes? Honestly, it is disgraceful that they weren't punished at all but rewarded with national honour. I also find the timing of this story a little strage, on the heels of Kamal Nath visiting Switzerland and Sikhs protesting there against his genocidal acts. A complaint against him was also lodged with the Attorney General there. I guess that must have prompted the unearthing of "Sikh terrorists", as if that somehow erases what Kamal Nath and the Indian governmet did to Sikhs in November 1984 and the decade that followed.