I received an email earlier this week from a non-Sikh friend of mine wishing me a Happy Independence Day. I think my reply surprised her. As Sikhs we really seem to be in a no-mans land between the euphoric celebrations of the Muslims and Hindus in having achieving there own homelands.

Independence Day is a sad day for most Sikhs as it brings back memories of the horrors of 1947. The creation of India and Pakistan resulted in one of the cruelest and bloodiest mass migrations and ethnic cleansing in human history. Over 18 million people were forced to move between the two countries and over 2 million Hindu, Muslim and Sikh men, women and children were killed. The Sikh homeland of Punjab was divided between two countries and the Sikhs were betrayed in the promises made to them by the Indian government.

I remember my grandmother telling me stories of seeing a family burned alive in from of her eyes. I've seen the pictures of Margaret Bourke White of a train station where an entire trainload of people were massacred simply because of their religion. How history repeats itself, it reminds me of 1984 where trains were stopped and Sikhs were massacred by Hindu mobs following Indira Gandhi's assassination. Not a single person has ever been brought to justice for a government directed killing spree in which thousands of Sikhs were killed across the country.

Today the only memories Sikhs have of Pakistan is of homes lost, family members killed or forced to convert to Islam and our holiest Sikh shrines and the birthplace of Guru Nanak standing empty or in ruins across West Punjab. In India Sikhs have been betrayed and are not recognized as a distinct people or religion by the Indian constitution or government. An entire generation of young Sikhs from every village has been brutally killed by the Indian government over the last 20 years and our most sacred shrine at Amritsar was violated and destroyed by the Indian army while thousands of innocent Sikh pilgrims were killed. Today's Punjab is but a fraction of its former size only 50 years ago. Today only two of the five rivers in the Land of Five Rivers even flows through Punjab.

It is ironic that a people who contributed so much to the independence movement (over 80% of people hanged by the British for agitation for independence were Sikh) have nothing to celebrate on 'Independence Day'.

Sandeep Singh (Brar) is an Internet technologist and developer of the widely acclaimed website www.sikhs.org.