I recently watched Satluj (formerly titled Punjab ’95), the biographical political drama directed by Honey Trehan, chronicling the life and struggle of human rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra, portrayed with remarkable restraint by Diljit Dosanjh. I finished the film with an overwhelming sense of restlessness. It is rare for a film to leave one emotionally unsettled long after the credits roll, but Satluj does exactly that. It is not simply cinema—it is a painful reminder of one of the darkest chapters in independent India’s history.
The film does not merely narrate the story of one courageous man; it forces the audience to confront the anguish of countless families who waited endlessly for fathers, sons, brothers, and husbands who never returned home. Every scene scratches wounds that time has failed to heal. Behind every unanswered question lies a family condemned to live with uncertainty, grief, and silence. Whether one views the events through the lens of human rights, constitutional law, or governance, the emotional burden carried by those families is impossible to ignore.
Watching Satluj reinforced a simple but profound truth: the greatest tragedy is not only that lives were lost, but that many families were denied even the dignity of knowing the fate of their loved ones. Democracies are ultimately measured not by the strength of their governments but by the compassion and accountability of their institutions. A nation that remembers these painful chapters honestly becomes stronger; a nation that chooses silence risks allowing history to repeat itself.
A government can defeat terrorism and still lose its moral authority. A police force can restore law and order, yet stand accused of violating the very law it exists to uphold. The story of Jaswant Singh Khalra forces India to confront this uncomfortable truth.
The Punjab of the 1980s and early 1990s was bleeding. Militancy had turned the State into a battlefield. Innocent civilians were massacred. Political leaders were assassinated. Police officers became daily targets. Fear ruled the streets, and restoring peace demanded extraordinary courage from countless security personnel. Many laid down their lives so that Punjab could live again. Their sacrifice deserves the nation’s gratitude.
But gratitude must never become an excuse for silence.
If terrorism challenged the sovereignty of India, the abuse of State power challenged the soul of India’s democracy.
Jaswant Singh Khalra did not wage war against the nation. He asked questions. He examined records. He sought answers for families whose loved ones had disappeared without explanation. He believed that the Constitution applied equally to every citizen and to every officer wearing a uniform.
For that, he paid with his life.
The courts eventually concluded that he had been abducted, illegally detained, murdered, and his body secretly disposed of by police personnel. These are not allegations whispered in drawing rooms or slogans shouted at political rallies. They are conclusions that emerged after investigation, trial, and judicial scrutiny.
That should disturb every Indian.
Because the gravest danger to democracy is not when criminals violate the law. The real danger begins when those empowered to enforce the law begin believing that they themselves are beyond it.
The Khalra episode is not merely a blot on Punjab Police. It is a blot on governance itself.
Where was the political leadership?
Where was administrative oversight?
Where were the safeguards meant to prevent abuse of power?
Every democracy invests enormous authority in its police. They have the legal power to arrest, investigate, search, detain, and use force when necessary. But that authority is not unconditional. It exists within the framework of constitutional accountability. The uniform is not a licence to suspend fundamental rights.
History repeatedly demonstrates a dangerous pattern. Governments confronted with insurgency often begin by expanding emergency powers. Then oversight weakens. Accountability becomes inconvenient. Human rights are dismissed as obstacles. Critics are labelled anti-national. Gradually, exceptional measures become ordinary practices.
That is the slippery slope every constitutional democracy must resist.
The fight against terrorism cannot be won by adopting methods that resemble lawlessness. Once the State begins operating outside the Constitution, it surrenders the very moral legitimacy that separates democracy from extremism.
The Constitution was not written for peaceful times alone.
It was written precisely for moments when governments face their greatest temptations.
Fundamental rights are not rewards for obedient citizens. They are protections against excessive State power.
This is why the Khalra case remains relevant three decades later.
It is not about reopening old political battles.
It is about asking whether India has genuinely learnt from one of its darkest institutional failures.
Successive governments often speak passionately about transparency while practising opacity. They praise whistle-blowers until those whistle-blowers expose the government itself. Suddenly, the messenger becomes the problem instead of the message.
That instinct is deeply dangerous.
Democracies do not collapse overnight through military coups. They weaken gradually when institutions begin protecting themselves instead of protecting justice.
Perhaps the most disturbing question remains unanswered.
Why must families spend decades seeking truth?
Why does accountability arrive only after enormous public pressure, relentless litigation, and years of judicial intervention?
Justice delayed does not merely burden victims. It weakens public faith in institutions.
The Khalra case also reminds us that governments change, but institutions remember.
Political parties frequently accuse their predecessors of misconduct while conveniently ignoring uncomfortable questions during their own tenure. Accountability cannot depend upon electoral cycles. Human rights cannot become ideological property.
No government should be permitted to investigate only its opponents while shielding its own.
No police force should ever believe that operational success places it above judicial scrutiny.
No democracy should confuse criticism with disloyalty.
There is another dimension that deserves equal attention.
The overwhelming majority of police officers perform extraordinarily difficult duties with honesty and courage. They protect citizens under impossible circumstances. They confront terrorists, organised criminals, and violent mobs at enormous personal risk.
Precisely because thousands of officers honour their oath, those who abuse the uniform must face uncompromising accountability.
Nothing damages the reputation of an honest police force more than the protection of dishonest officers.
Silence is institutional corruption.
Accountability is institutional strength.
Punjab today has moved forward. Its people have rebuilt their lives with remarkable resilience. Young generations deserve to inherit hope instead of hatred. But healing cannot be built upon selective memory.
A society that remembers only its victories while forgetting its mistakes prepares itself to repeat them.
The Jaswant Singh Khalra case should therefore remain compulsory reading in every police academy, every law school, and every civil service institution. Not as an indictment of an entire generation of officers, but as a permanent warning about the consequences of unchecked State power.
The Republic owes that much to itself.
The greatest tribute India can pay to Jaswant Singh Khalra is not another memorial, another anniversary, or another speech. It is the unwavering commitment that no citizen—regardless of ideology, religion, region, or political belief—will ever disappear into the shadows of unlawful custody again.
Governments possess power.
The Constitution imposes limits on that power.
Whenever those limits are ignored, democracy itself becomes the victim.
Punjab defeated terrorism. That victory should remain a source of pride. But the Khalra episode reminds us that the means by which peace is secured matter just as much as peace itself.
A nation is not judged only by how it fights its enemies.
It is judged by whether, in the heat of conflict, it remains faithful to the principles that define its civilization.
That is the enduring lesson of Jaswant Singh Khalra.
And that is why his story must never be forgotten.
