June 1984[Web]

Operation Blue Star

Name: Operation Blue Star
Start: 1984-06
Location: Amritsar

The Indian Army enters the Harmandir complex at Amritsar to remove armed militants led by Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale. The Akal Takht is badly damaged and the Sikh Reference Library is lost, though what became of its collection is disputed. Indira Gandhi's assassination and anti-Sikh massacres follow in the autumn.

ModernPolitics📍 Amritsar

Casualty figures are disputed, and accounts differ on how the library came to burn and on what survived. The SGPC acknowledged in 2019 that it had received back 205 manuscripts and 807 books. See the history of this era and the artifact record for the library.[Web][Web]