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Punjab Extremists Murder Politician Opposing Sikh State

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From Reuters

Extremists in Punjab on Thursday shot to death a prominent Communist politician known for his outspoken opposition to the campaign for a separate Sikh state, police said.

A senior police official said that Darshan Singh Canadian, 80, was killed by two gunmen as he rode a bicycle in Mahilpur village in Punjab’s Hoshiarpur district.

Canadian, a leader of the Communist Party of India, took his name from a stay in Canada in the 1920s when he worked as an activist with the Canadian Communist Party.

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The police official said the politician had apparently been marked for assassination because of his opposition to the extremist campaign for an independent Sikh nation, called Khalistan--the Land of the Pure.

The attack followed the killing in the Sikh holy city of Amritsar of a policeman involved in anti-extremist operations.

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