How did the 1984 Sikh Genocide shape the discourse on minority rights and religious freedom in India?

Assignment Question

Research Question: How did the 1984 Sikh Genocide shape the discourse on minority rights and religious freedom in India?

Below is an outline of what you should answer or address in each section:

Introduction What is the research puzzle? For example, what about your country of expertise led you to this question? As an example: In class, we discussed the puzzle of when racial/ethnic conflict occurs and why it occurs when it does. We asked questions like, “Why did the Rwandan Genocide occur in 1994?” (both the question of why then versus another time and the question of why did this conflict happen at all) What is the research question? This is the question that would add to the political science literature on the topic. As an example: For the puzzle mentioned above, one might ask the larger question of “Under what conditions does racial/ethnic conflict occur?” Note that this question is not specifically asking about the Rwandan Genocide, but it may look at the Rwandan Genocide as a case study to answer this question. An easy way to think of what makes a good research question that seeks to explore a causal relationship is whether it can take the form mentioned above: “Under what conditions does Y occur?” OR “Under what conditions does X [lead to/increase/decrease/etc.] Y?” This is for the situation in which you are interested in the effect of a particular variable – for example, “Under what conditions does nationalist rhetoric lead to ethnic conflict?

Background: Provide the historical background of the topic – Where and when does this issue arise? Who are some of the important actors that someone should know about if they are looking at a project on this topic?

Literature Review: What have scholars said about this question – or at least the general topic? Use sites like the library website and Google Scholar to find relevant articles If scholars haven’t asked this exact question already, then what related questions have they asked? If they have asked this question, then what would your project add to the scholarly conversation? Would you be looking at a case or cases that other scholars have not examined and seeing if existing theories apply? Would you be taking an argument from a related topic and seeing if it applies to your topic?

Works Cited: List OR Footnote Citations List, in full citation form, all of the resources that you have referenced for the research. You may choose whatever citation format you want, as long as it is consistent throughout the paper: for example, if you choose to use Chicago format with footnote citations, then you should use that throughout the paper. If you choose to use APA or another parenthetical citation format, then make sure to include the citations (author name, year, and page numbers where needed) within the body of the paper, with the full citation in the Works Cited list at the end.