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Over half dozen Indians injured in Sikh temple clashes

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Over half a dozen people have been injured in a violent sword battle at the holiest shrine of the Sikh community in the northern Indian city of Amritsar.

The assault occurred at the Golden Temple on Friday during a ceremony marking the anniversary of the deadly Indian army assault on the shrine 30 years ago.

Supporters of the Shiromani Akali Dal party brandishing swords and wooden sticks turned violent before they were chased away by the guards, the temple management spokesperson said.

The attackers were shouting slogans for an independent homeland for the Sikhs.

Police detained nearly 50 people during the melee, with many shops closing because of the tension.

The 1984 army raid on the Golden Temple marks one of the deadliest episodes in India’s contemporary battle against Sikh separatists.

The operation eventually led to the assassination of the then prime minister, Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards.

The insurgency, however, was crushed in the late 1980s.

Meanwhile, British Foreign Secretary William Hague in February admitted that London was involved in the June 1984 massacre.

Hague acknowledged that a British officer from the Special Air Service (SAS) travelled to India in February that year and advised Indian authorities on planning one of the most notorious atrocities in Britain’s imperial history in the South Asian country.

In February last year, British Prime Minister David Cameron visited the scene of the massacre in the state of Punjab at the end of his three-day trade trip to India but he stopped short of making a formal apology.

The death toll from the temple raid still remains disputed, with Indian authorities putting it in the hundreds and Sikh groups in the thousands.

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