Jalandhar: In a rare act of solidarity, the Punjab Legislative Assembly on March 6 observed a few minutes of silence in memory of the more than 160 school girls who lost their lives in the deadly US-Israel strikes on Iran. The House also paid homage to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israel strikes on February 28.

The tributes were offered at the beginning of the budget session of the Punjab Assembly. So far, Punjab is the only state in the country to pay its tributes to Khamenei and the Iranian school girls inside the the state legislature.

The assassination of Khamenei, 86, has triggered a war in the Middle East and West Asia, affecting hundreds of people and stranding others. The minor girls from Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary school were killed in the Minab bombing on the same day Khamenei was assassinated by US-Israel. Iran observed a mass funeral for the school children on March 3, which saw thousands of mourners on the streets of Minab.

An impassioned video of the Punjab legislative assembly observing silence as tributes to the school children and Khamenei went viral on social media, with many users from the Middle East hailing the state’s initiative and lauding the Sikh community in particular.

In the video, Sukhwinder Kumar Sukhi, a ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA from the Banga assembly constituency of Nawanshahr district, is seen requesting Punjab assembly speaker Kultar Singh Sandhwan to observe silence for the mass killing of school children and the assasination of Khamenei.

“An inhuman incident happened in Iran in which around 165 girls were killed who were studying in the school at that time. Many doctors and patients, who were in the hospital were killed and Iran’s supreme leader Khamenei was also killed,” Sukhi, who is a doctor by profession said in the assembly.

“While I condemn what the Trump government did, I pay my tributes. I urge you that, if possible, pay tribute to them,” he added.

Thereafter, assembly speaker Sandhwan urged the house members to observe silence and pay homage in the memory of the departed souls.

Speaking to The Wire, MLA Sukhi said, “As a Punjabi, we have been taught to stand against injustice and support the weak. I am also a follower of Kanshi Ram’s ideology, the founder of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), which taught us to fight and stand against oppression. I would like to highlight that not just Iran, I had also raised the issue of violence in Manipur in the Punjab legislative assembly.”

Sukhi........

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