Jaswant Singh Khalra's investigation of disappearances led him to Amritsar's municipal cremation grounds, where he discovered records revealing that the Punjab police had paid for firewood to cremate thousands of "unidentified bodies." The records also exposed the identity of the police stations and officials responsible for depositing the bodies, and in many cases, the identity of the victim, despite the body being classified as "unclaimed/unidentified."

Atmosphere of Violence
In the early 1990s, the escalation of violence in Punjab and the targeting of human rights defenders effectively paralyzed human rights groups in the state. According to official police figures published in 1993, security forces in Punjab killed more than 2,000 alleged Sikh "militants" in 1992 alone, during "encounters" (exchanges of gunfire). However, a large number of people killed by police in alleged "encounters" were picked up by the Indian security forces for interrogation and simply "disappeared." Reports published in March of 1992 by the English- language daily, The Pioneer , suggested that many of the "disappeared" were killed and their bodies quietly dumped into Punjab's irrigation canals. Moreover, Indian security forces eliminated leading human rights figures such as Ram Singh Billing and Jagwinder Singh, as well as detained former Punjab and Haryana High Court Justice Ajit Singh Bains, for speaking out against the systematic killings.
During this time, Khalra joined the human rights wing of the Akali Dal political party to put the issues of justice and rule of law on the political agenda.

Investigations
In the middle of 1994, the police illegally arrested Khalra's friend, Dara Singh, a bank director in Amritsar district. Upon investigation, Khalra discovered that the Punjab police reported Dara Singh's death as an "encounter" with the Punjab police and cremated his body at Durgiana Mandir cremation ground as "unidentified and unclaimed." The discovery prompted further investigation into cremation records, as well as records of firewood purchases made by police in order to carry out the cremations. On January 16, 1995, Jaswant Singh Khalra and Jaspal Singh Dhillon revealed thousands of cremation records in just three crematoria between 1984 and 1994. All were listed as "unidentified" - just like Dara Singh.
In their press release, Khalra and Dhillon pointed out that the police had been carrying out these cremations in violation of the Police Act of 1861. Official protocol requires the Punjab police to record a detailed description of the body, take photos and fingerprints, and take all "reasonable measures" to secure identification. After completing the process, the investigating officer should hand over the body to a willing charitable society. Cremation of the body by the police is a last resort. However, the police were regularly carrying out illegal secret cremations even when the full identities of the deceased were known. The press release emphasized the necessity of providing grieving families with information about what happened to their abducted loved ones so that they could perform the last rites and gain some closure.

Threats From Authorities
On January 18, 1995, DGP K.P.S. Gill scoffed at the allegations, telling reporters that "thousands of Sikh youth who had left for foreign countries under fake names and documents were claiming to be missing persons killed by security forces in encounters" (Tribune, January 19, 1995). Jaswant Singh Khalra immediately offered to "put forth the evidence" to prove that the persons cremated by the police as "unidentified and unclaimed" had actually been killed in the state custody, mostly in "fake encounters."
Soon thereafter, Khalra began receiving threatening telephone calls at his residence. Policemen in plain clothes began to lurk around outside his house, and sometimes even came to the house to ask for his itinerary. On February 27, 1995, Khalra organized another press conference in Amritsar to announce that the Punjab government was "highly mistaken in thinking that by eliminating him, the matter relating to 25,000 unclaimed bodies" in Punjab "can be put to an end." Khalra further asserted that he was prepared to die for the cause of justice and appealed to the people to "hold the police chief KPS Gill and chief minister Beant Singh" responsible, "instead of a police cat or an inspector" if something happened to him.

International Tour
In March and July 1995, Khalra visited Canada and England to publicize his findings and to meet with international human rights organizations, members of parliament, and other prominent figures to urge them to pressure the Indian government into initiating investigations into the matter of illegal cremations in the Punjab.
In the second week of August, some officers of the Intelligence Bureau (IB) visited Khalra and questioned him about his foreign visits. Khalra became anxious due to the increased surveillance and continuous visits by security officials, and consulted many friends and associates about his fears. All his friends advised him to invest in bodyguards and leave Amritsar for a time.

Assassination of the Chief Minister
On August 31, 1995, Punjab's chief minister Beant Singh and 17 others were killed when a powerful bomb exploded outside his office in Chandigarh. Beant Singh's successor, Harcharan Singh Brar, launched a massive operation to capture the killers. Khalra suspected that security officials would take advantage of their political support to exact revenge on him.
His father, Kartar Singh, asked his son why he felt the need to pursue the issue of secret cremations. Khalra asked in reply, "Does it really matter whether I die on my bed, in an accident or as a martyr of my cause?"
On September 6th, 1995, Jaswant Singh Khalra was taken from his home by Punjab police. Less than two months later, he was killed.
For more information on Jaswant Singh Khalra's life and legacy, please see Reduced to Ashes, Chapter 1, available here.