ECB is about differentiating Sikhs
from the word 'Asian.'
Its a Vision to help raise awareness
of Sikhs in the Western World,
their history,beliefs and identity.
The Dalai Lama [Images] said on Tuesday that his successor would be chosen outside of Tibet if he dies in exile. "If my death comes when we are still in a refugee status, then logically my reincarnation will come outside Tibet," the he said on the sidelines of an inter-faith meeting in the Sikh holy city.
The Dalai Lama said he welcomed the promotion of good relations between India and China. He said he was always ready to negotiate between Tibetans and Chinese government and would always give priority to talks.
"My mission is to spread the message of peace, prosperity and love and this reason brought me here to the holy city of the Golden Temple," added the Dalai Lama.
The Tibetan spiritual leader visited the Golden Temple and paid obeisance in the sanctum sanctorum where he was honoured by the Sikh priest with a scarf. The Dalai Lama also paid obeisance at Akal Takht, the highest Sikh temporal seat, at the Golden Temple.
The Dalai Lama was honoured by the Shriomnai Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee president Avtar Singh Makkar and jathedar of the Akal Takht, Gyani Joginder Singh Vedanti, with woollen shawls, a set of Sikh religious books and a replica of the Golden Temple.
The Dalai Lama is in Amritsar [Images] to participate in the third meeting of the Elijah board of world religious leaders, a group founded in 1996 to promote inter-faith dialogue, that brings together prominent Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, Muslims, Christians and Buddhists.
As a Sikh, Sukhvir Singh says he has encountered racial harassment before, but he never feared it could lead to his death.
But on Saturday, police say, the Orange Cab driver withstood a violent attack from a drunken passenger who punched him, bit off a piece of his scalp, called Singh an "Iraqi terrorist" and threatened to kill him. The attack ended after a Metro bus pulled up to the cab and a passenger called 911.
Luis Vázquez, a 20-year-old construction worker from Kent, was charged Tuesday with third-degree assault and one count of malicious harassment, the state's hate-crime law. If convicted, Vázquez faces up to a year in jail, according to a spokesman for the King County Prosecutor's Office.
After the attack, Singh was treated at Harborview Medical Center and released. He was later admitted to Valley Medical Center in Renton and remains hospitalized because of kidney problems. He said it's unclear whether the problems are a result of the attack.
Speaking from his hospital bed Tuesday, Singh said it is difficult to talk about the attack, but he is grateful for the outpouring of support from the community.
"I live here, and I love America. I love to serve my community and my people here," said Singh, of Kent, a father of two. "It's very hard to think about."
Intoxicated passenger
Singh was stopping at a Montlake neighborhood grocery to grab dinner Saturday before 8 p.m. when Seattle police escorted an obviously drunken man to his cab, said the cabdriver's attorney, Hardeep Rekhi. Singh, a cabdriver for seven years, said it's not uncommon for police to place intoxicated people in his cab so they can be driven home.
Authorities say the passenger was Vázquez. They said he had been kicked out of the Apple Cup football game at Husky Stadium.
While Singh was driving Vázquez home, Vázquez started calling him a terrorist and threatened to kill him, according to court charging documents. Singh said he worried for his life and the lives of other motorists as he drove down Interstate 5 at 60 mph.
Singh pulled over just south of the exit for Interstate 90, according to charging papers.
Vázquez followed Singh as he left the cab and continued the attack, court papers said. It was only when a Metro bus pulled up and Vázquez tried to board that the attack stopped, according to charging papers.
Vázquez later told investigators that he was afraid of Singh because Vázquez "had a buddy in Iraq," according to charging papers. Singh isn't Iraqi. He's an Indian-born member of the Sikh religion, which claims up to a half-million followers in the U.S.
Because the case appears to be a hate crime, the FBI has launched a civil-rights inquiry, said spokeswoman Robbie Burroughs. The facts gathered by agents will be sent to the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C., and if attorneys there think more information is necessary, the FBI will launch a full-blown investigation, Burroughs said.
The New York-based Sikh Coalition was pushing for prosecutors to file the case as a hate crime.
Rekhi, the Seattle attorney representing Singh, said his client is pleased with the filing decision.
Singh said that even though he has never been called such awful names, his fellow Sikh cabdrivers have faced worse violence and terror.
On Sept. 13, 2001, Farwest Cab driver Kulwinder Singh was assaulted and accused of being a Middle East terrorist by an intoxicated passenger he picked up in SeaTac. Raymond Isais Jr., 21, of San Diego, pleaded guilty to malicious harassment.
"Safe transport"
Explaining why officers placed a drunken man in Singh's cab, Seattle police Sgt. Deanna Nollette said the department's protocol with intoxicated people is to simply find them "safe transport."
The State Patrol, which is also investigating the attack, doesn't believe Seattle police did anything wrong by putting Vázquez in Singh's cab.
"The goal of law enforcement at that venue was getting him home. There was no lawful reason to detain him," said State Patrol spokesman Jeff Merrill. "For some particular reason, this guy in this scenario snapped."
More than 50 members of the Sikh community and a delegation of OC Transpo employees bid an emotional farewell yesterday morning to the four members of the Brar family found dead in their Grandpark Circle home on Nov. 21.
Santbir Brar, his wife, Amarjeet, and their daughters Manmeet, 20, and Dildeep, 22, died as the result of a murder-suicide. Police believe Mr. Brar, an OC Transpo supervisor, killed his family before turning a rifle on himself.
Four hearses backed up to the crematorium at the Capital Memorial Gardens on Prince of Wales Drive and one by one, the flower-bedecked caskets were carried into the building.
Mr. Brar's brother, Gurinder, who returned from a visit to India following the deaths, had to be helped from the building, overcome with grief. His wife had to be lifted from the ground after she collapsed into the slush after the coffins were taken inside.
Mr. and Mrs. Brar were cremated in the morning following final prayers, while their daughters were cremated later in the day.
A family friend, who did not want to be identified, talked briefly afterwards, calling the afternoon service for the sisters "very emotional" for everyone.
"We just want to remember them," said the woman, adding nobody really knows what happened at the Brar family home a week ago.
She called Mr. Brar and his wife loving parents.
She said they cared about their family and that is why last week's events are so hard to understand.
Baldev S. Vij, an Ottawa real estate agent, said members of the community had been deeply shocked by the deaths. "God knows what happened," Mr. Vij said. "The community will come together to try to figure out what took place."
He said that while the family was known to the Sikh community, in general they tended to keep to themselves.
A woman who declined to be identified said the ashes will be given to family members, who will take them to India to be scattered on a river that is holy to Sikhs.
Before the ceremonies inside the crematorium, mourners were led by the priest from the Ottawa Gurudawara, or temple, in prayers.
London Mayor Ken Livingstone points to bullet holes in a wall at the site of the 1919 massacre at Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar, yesterday. On April 13, 1919, British Indian Army soldiers under the command of Brigadier Reginald Dyer opened fire on an unarmed gathering of men, women and children in Jallianwala Bagh holding a protest rally. The firing lasted about 10 minutes. According to official estimates, nearly 400 civilians were killed. However, according to private sources, the number was over 1,000, with more than 2,000 wounded. Livingstone is on a week-long trip to India.
Kabul, Nov 25 - 'Waheguru Ji ka Khalsa, Waheguru Ji ki Fateh,' the traditional chant of the Sangat, reverberated in the large hall of the gurudwara at the Dharmasala in Kart-e-Parwan district of Kabul as more than 300 members of Sikh community gathered there to celebrate Gurparb, the birthday of Guru Nanak, the founder of Sikh religion.
The nearly three-hour ceremony Saturday at the 45-year-old gurudwara in the district, which is home to most of the Sikh community, was filled with religious chants, prayers and devotional songs.
School children recited their self-composed poems in the honour of Guru Nanak, while several speakers repeatedly conveyed the message of religious harmony, universal brotherhood, peaceful coexistence and humanitarian assistance through their speeches during the ceremony.
India's Ambassador to Afghanistan Rakesh Sood, who was an invitee to the ceremony, conveyed his greetings and good wishes to all members of the community on the festive occasion. 'I am impressed by the organisation and your ability to cherish and celebrate the tradition and culture,' Sood told the attentive gathering.
He also congratulated the children for composing and reciting poems on the occasion.
Afghan Sikhs moved to Afghanistan generations ago and they feel at home in this country. All of them are fluent in Dari and Pastho with some able to converse in other languages like Uzbeki.
'We are Afghans and think like any other Afghan,' said a contented Avatar Singh, a member of Dharmasala management committee, who appears no different from other Afghans with his neatly tied blue turban and shiny and flowing black beard.
Pointing to sizeable presence of Afghan Muslims at the function, Ravinder Singh, another member of the gurudwara management committee, said, 'All these are our friends. We treat them as our own brothers and sisters. Though our worship system may be different, we are part and parcel of Afghan society.'
Ravinder Singh, who speaks Pastho and Dari fluently, is a fourth generation Afghan Sikh living in Kabul. Though his clothes business keeps him busy through out, he makes it point to come regularly to gurudwara to pray with his family.
With a broad grin, he said, 'This is an important festival for Sikhs. The Gurparb in Dharmasala attracts devotees from Kabul but all over in Afghanistan'. For him, functions like Gurparb is also important for renewing the bonds and contacts within the community members.
Gurparb ended with the traditional 'langar' (community meals) served to all the devotees and invitees.
A MEET your Sikh neighbour event is being held in the Capital today as part of Inter-Faith Week.
The colourful Sikh Gurdwara on Sheriff Brae in Leith is hosting the first official event of the week between 2pm and 3.30pm.
The event is an opportunity to gain a brief insight into the beliefs and lives of Edinburgh and Scottish Sikhs. Visitors will be treated to an introductory talk on Sikhism, followed by a short question and answer session.
Sikhs are holding their own three-day celebrations, which started yesterday with continuous 24-hour reading of sacred Sikh scriptures.
They will also have a flag-changing ceremony outside the Gurdwara today at 1pm. Wege Singh, pictured, of the Edinburgh Sikh Gurdwara, said: "This is a significant celebratory and commemoration weekend."
London, Nov 21 - As the issue involving a Sikh girl's suspension from a Welsh school for wearing a kada, a symbol of Sikhism, appeared headed for the courts, hundreds of people from around the world backed the girl through a website set up to support her. Sarika Watkins-Singh, 14, of mixed Welsh-Punjabi parentage, has been suspended three times from the Aberdare Girls School for wearing the kada. The school says that wearing it goes against its code, which only allows watches and stud-earrings. Human rights organisation Liberty, which is directed by Shami Chakrabarti, has taken up Sarika's case. It is arguing that by excluding Sarika, the school's governing body has violated violating the Race Relations Act 1976, the Equality Act 2006 and the Human Rights Act 1998. Angry, passionate messages against the school authorities have been left by visitors on the website www.supportsarika.co.uk. The website features press and video coverage of the case that has hit the headlines across Britain and elsewhere. Anna Fairclough, Liberty's legal officer representing the Singhs, said: 'The governing body of the school has ignored established race and equality protections and shamefully turned a young woman into a pariah by isolating her.
'Legal precedents established 25 years ago make clear that she should be allowed to wear the kara without being intimidated by the school.'
Over the past 18 months of writing on Cif, I have been consistent in my criticism of "community leaders" who claim to speak on behalf of people of minority religious backgrounds. This is for two main reasons: firstly because their motives are never as benign as they claim; secondly because they have a rather cosy relationship with religious extremists of the same backgrounds. This applies to Sikh and Hindu organisations as much as it does to British Muslim ones, though the former attract less media interest for obvious reasons.
Even if they don't command grassroots support, these organisations remain relevant by riding on legitimate concerns. For example, though there is little backing for an independent Sikh state, the Sikh Federation UK retains support by emphasising human rights abuses against Sikhs in India to bolster its cause. The Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) similarly rides on concerns that Muslims as a whole are being demonised and actively voices their opposition to the war in Iraq. The MCB benefits by taking a hardline position on issues and clearly makes people more wary of British Muslims thanks to its over-the-top assertions and contradictions. There is little point to its existence.
But this should not detract from the fact that the threat of terrorism is being used by anti-democratic forces to subvert our parliamentary traditions. The first is an attack on our civil liberties, from the threat of extending the 28-day detention period to locking up people for "thought crime". Those who maintain this is business as usual are deluding themselves.
The second problem relates to the continuing media scaremongering about Muslims. There are legitimate concerns such as finding hate literature in bookshops of course, but the scale of outright lies, hysterics and rubbish coverage is really quite disturbing.
In case you missed it, a recent speech by the director general of MI5, Jonathan Evans, essentially said the media was doing the terrorists' work for them. It doesn't get more stark than that.
The inevitable retort is that the threat of terrorism makes this not only inevitable but necessary. But I don't subscribe to the view that a liberal democracy, founded on the principle of equality before law, should discriminate against an entire group based on their faith due to the violent actions of a few. The Japanese American internment of 1948 was wrong and similarly it would have been disgusting to launch a witch-hunt against homosexuals in the 1980s over Aids. Why should ordinary Muslims be lumped with the jihadis?
We know this new legislation is aimed solely at British Muslims and no one else. If British whites were under serious threat of being convicted for thought crimes, there would be a furore. Instead we have a few embarrassing coughs.
Similarly, Martin Amis's racism and the Evening Standard's perniciously titled debate ("Is Islam good for London?") points to the same thing: the intentional demonisation of Muslims has become legitimate discourse.
All the while, British Muslim leadership on these issues is seriously lacking. The MCB's Dr Abdul Bari and Inayat Bunglawala are great at worsening media relations, annoying other religious groups and generally worsening social cohesion. They care about the latter when Muslims are being demonised but not when the hatred is being spewed by Muslims. New Labour can afford to ignore its protests because most Britons view it very negatively.
The MCB can even be relied on to make excuses for the racism of extremist organisations like Hizb ut-Tahrir, thereby alienating the left even more. Ordinary British Muslims cannot do anything but watch their civil liberties erode further.
There is only one way out of this impasse. Rather than treating British Muslims as a monolithic group represented by the likes of the MCB, we should regard them as fellow citizens and actively defend the attack on their civil liberties. If we don't do it then the Islamists will step in.
This is vital not only to defeating terrorism but also protecting our democratic rights. On Sunday Henry Porter said "We must not tolerate this putsch against our freedoms". I agree. Under the threat of terrorism this government is doing everything it can in order to curtail our freedoms, hoping it will succeed by tacitly indicating that it will only apply to Muslims.
We can either get organised and resist this or be willing participants.
BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — The Clinton campaign's abrupt cancellation of scheduled appearances here is leaving members of the Sikh community dismayed and demanding an explanation.
Traditional food, elaborate costumes, and ritual sword fighting were on display as thousands of Sikhs celebrated a religious festival here yesterday, but the expected guest of honor, Senator Clinton, was a no-show. Mrs. Clinton also scuttled a fund-raising breakfast at a nearby fairgrounds where Sikh leaders had hoped to raise $1 million for her presidential campaign.
Some organizers cited "security reasons" for the candidate's sudden withdrawal. An advertisement in a Sikh newspaper said the fund-raiser, which was also to have featured President Clinton as a guest, had been postponed "due to the advice of the Secret Service." Others involved said some of those planning the fund-raiser failed either the campaign's vetting process or a Secret Service review.
Whatever prompted the late change, many of those who attended yesterday's festival and parade were upset, underscoring the risks of a backlash against Mrs. Clinton as her campaign tightens its standards in an effort to avoid another fund-raising scandal.
"We don't know what the reason is," a trucking company owner who helped arrange the celebration, Tejpal Singh of Bakersfield, said. "They just tell us last night. … Everybody's shocked. They want to see her."
Mr. Singh said he was informed a week or two ago that Mrs. Clinton planned to spend about 30 minutes at the festival, which marks the birthday of one of the founders of the Sikh religion, Guru Nanak Dev Ji.
So here we go again. There was the 'silver ring' case of a girl barred by her school from wearing a piece of jewellery which turned out to be more a campaign symbol than an essential expression of faith. Her parents lost her case, but are appealing. There have been a couple of complaints about airlines, religion and dress codes. Now there is the matter of a Sikh girl told that she cannot wear a bangle to school.
Each of these instances is different. Some involve what looks like the politicisation of the 'presentation' issue, while the latest seems to be about the definition of equal and fair treatment for different sections of the community in relation to specific company or organisational policy.
As for Sarika Watkins-Singh, aged 14, a pupil at Aberdare Girls’ School, who has refused to remove her kara, which reminds its wearers to do good, her case has been backed by the non-religious civil rights group Liberty. So trying to turn this into a catch-all complaint about 'religion' won't work, either. It has wider ramifications for free expression. There are race equality considerations, too.
With some activists trying to push to 'keep religion out of the workplace' altogether, and some religious lobbyists using the power of symbolic representation to reassert themselves at a time when they perceive their influence to be under threat, there is a danger that all sense of perspective and proportion will be lost.
Until recently, with the odd exception, most organisations have come up with pragmatic approaches aimed at keeping everyone on board and included within the bounds of a common (legally sound) policy. That is how it should be, and it is the situation we need to encourage. Less heat, more light for everyone to share.
We should not look at religious clothing and symbols as if they are something entirely separate from the way in which we dress generally, either. We live in a consumer-driven society that encourages us to be distinctive, to be individual, to express ourselves in ways that are different to other people as well as peer-associated.
It seems extraordinary for someone to feel threatened just because one expression of difference (or solidarity) in an intentionally plural society is religious. In monocultural, illiberal or theocratic orders the issue is quite different, of course.
In a fast-changing world, there will always be things that appear strange to others. If it’s not the way people dress, it’ll be the colour of their skin; if it’s not the colour of their skin it will be something else, such as customs, patterns of thought, or language. The question is: how can we learn to cope with that, and even benefit from it?
You cannot and should not ban something just because it makes you feel uncomfortable. Instead of building walls, we should build relationships. We should strive for a situation in which people are prepared to be open towards others, including the variety of their appearance and presentation.
People dress in all sorts of ways that reflect their lifestyle. And it isn’t always straightforward to identify what is, or isn’t, inspired by religion. For example, some people wear a cross for religious reasons, while others wear one simply as jewellery.
I am certainly not opposed to a company or school having a dress or symbol policy that reflects corporate image, equal respect or health and safety concerns. Nevertheless, the idea of introducing a blanket ban on religious symbols in public institutions (such as the Iranian campaigner Azar Majedi has advocated) is only dealing with something by repressing it, rather than by encouraging people to understand each other better, which is the principle a modern, peaceful and fair society should be built upon.
So long as the form of dress is not dangerous, unhealthy, contrary to the needs of the task undertaken, or deliberately designed to menace or threaten someone else — in which case it becomes a public order issue — then we should seek to allow it wherever possible. That should be the default, though there will be exceptions and local circumstances.
Mediation and mutual adaptation should be viewed as the appropriate way forward, rather than prescription and litigation.
I personally feel great sympathy with the view that some Muslim veils can be seen as a tool of oppression. Complete covering is also not part of the tradition, and compulsion is to be deplored. Muslims have argued that, too. But I also respect the views of some women who say that it can be about protecting themselves from the invasive gaze of a male-dominated order.
As a plural society, we’re not going to reach an agreement on whether such veiling is a good or bad thing — but a ban wouldn’t solve anything. It would simply push the issue underground, up the ante for those who wish to squeeze political capital out of it, and cause more bitterness.
Indeed, the debate over religious symbols and dress is often a proxy for more complex political and cultural concerns. In some cases is has been picked up by groups with bigger agendas linked to racism or xenophobia. For individuals, a small fight over a personal item might reflect a sense of injustice about wider issues that are not being addressed.
We should acknowledge that living in a multicultural society has made some individuals feel anxious about their identity. But that anxiety - about self or toward others - will not be resolved by legal measures.
Like Azar Majedi, I believe in the positive virtue of secularity in the public square. But for me that does not mean one in which religious (or indeed anti-religious) expression has to be hidden away — it is one in which we acknowledge that we have to share public space and find ways of communicating with one another across our differences.
A PREGNANT Muslim teenager, allegedly stabbed to death by her Sikh love rival, was disappointed with her arranged marriage, a court heard today.
Sana Ali, aged 17, told her mother she was feeling lonely in the days leading up to her death because her husband was staying out late.
Birmingham dental student Harmohinder Kaur Sanghera, 23, had been having an affair with the victim's husband, Sair Ali, for nearly two years, Manchester Crown Court heard yesterday.
Sarika Singh, with the bangle on her wrist, leaves school with her mother Sanita Singh
Sarika Singh, 14, has refused to remove the silver bangle, or Kara, which she regards as a sign of her faith.
Aberdare Girls' School, in South Wales, said the bangle broke its code of conduct. Pupils are allowed to wear only a wrist watch and one pair of plain metal stud earrings. It added that the rules had been in place for many years and had been set up to ensure equality.
Sarika is the only Sikh at the school. Her mother, Sanita Singh, 38, has taken legal advice and plans to challenge the school's decision.
Mrs Singh, her daughter, and a representative from the Valleys Race Equality Council, a self-styled charitable voluntary organisation, attended a meeting at the school yesterday with the head teacher, Jane Rosser.
Wayne Lee, a spokesman for the council, confirmed that the pupil had been excluded from school again.
"Sarika is very upset and wants to go back into school. She is a good student and she wants to see her friends like any other 14-year-old."
Sarika was taken out of her classes and taught separately for nine weeks pending the outcome of an appeal. She was excluded this month when she continued to ignore the ban.
Her mother said: "We feel very strongly that Sarika has a right to manifest her religion. She is not asking for anything big and flashy, she is not making a big fuss."
Sarika, from Cwmbach, near Aberdare, said: "It is very important for me to wear the Kara because it is a symbol of my faith and a constant reminder that I should only do good work, and never do anything bad, with my hands."
The governors rejected the girl's request to wear the bangle after examining the uniform policy and human rights legislation.
The school said it would not comment until it had told Mrs Singh of the latest suspension in writing.
Liberty, the human rights group, which is providing legal representation for Mrs Singh, said the law lords had ruled that Sikh pupils could wear items representing their faith, including a turban.
Anna Fairclough, Liberty's legal officer, said: "Legal precedents established 25 years ago make clear she should be allowed to wear the Kara."
A spokesman for the Welsh Assembly said rules on uniform were a matter for schools' governing bodies, but issues such as equality and health and safety should be considered. The spokesman added: "Whether a school uniform policy breaches the Race Relations Act 1976 is a matter for the courts."
The Valleys Race Equality Council, whose director is Ron Davies, the former Welsh Secretary, was set up 10 years ago with the aim of working towards "eliminating racial discrimination".
Mr Davies has twice resigned from political office after speculation about his private life.
He left the Labour cabinet in 1998 after a "moment of madness" involving two men on Clapham Common, south London. He denied the incident had anything to do with sex.
He won a Welsh Assembly seat in 1999 but stood down before the elections in 2003 after a newspaper claimed he had been visiting a cruising spot near a motorway layby.
Mr Davies said he was actually badger-watching.
He resigned from the Labour Party in 2004, citing its stance on Iraq as one of his reasons.
My encounter with Monty Panesar does not get off to the best of starts. The publishers of his autobiography, Monty's Turn, have organised several one-on-one interviews on the terrace of a hotel overlooking the Thames at Hampton Court, and after The Daily Telegraph it is my turn. But first of all the Telegraph's photographer, for reasons known only to himself, wants his man in a rowing boat. Looking understandably bemused, Panesar clambers into the boat and rows out to the middle of the river, the photographer snapping away frantically as they almost come a cropper in the wash of a passing pleasure cruiser. Mudhsuden Singh Panesar, it has to be said, is no Steve Redgrave.
This surreal episode concludes after almost half an hour with their safe return to shore, but by then heavy clouds have started to invade Panesar's naturally sunny nature. Who knows, maybe that was the Telegraph man's fiendish intention. Whatever, I make what in retrospect is an unwise attempt to introduce some humour into the situation. For The Independent's photograph, I tell Panesar, we would like him to swim to the opposite bank. As an attempt to break the ice it is a spectacular failure. He glares at me. In his dark brown eyes there is fiery pride and indignation, which, were they not directed my way, I would be pleased to see. There is steel in this man, as well as sunshine.
Swiftly changing the subject, I ask whether he goes to Sri Lanka for the forthcoming Test series feeling the burden of expectation. After all, when he last played against Sri Lanka in a Test match, at Trent Bridge in June last year, he took 5 for 78 in the second innings. And one of the five was the barnstorming Sanath Jayasuriya. The Sri Lankans know his capabilities.
"No," he says, "I still have a lot to prove to earn expectations. With more experience there will be expectations of me, but I don't feel it."
Whatever he says, his reputation already precedes him. In just 20 Tests, he already has six five-fors and one 10-wicket haul. His first Test wicket was that of his childhood hero Sachin Tendulkar. His first Ashes wicket was that of Justin Langer. His 73 Test victims also include Rahul Dravid (twice), Younis Khan (twice), Inzamam-ul-Haq (three times), Adam Gilchrist (for a duck), Matthew Hayden, and Shivnarine Chanderpaul (twice). And he snared Tendulkar again, lbw for 16 at Lord's this summer. It is by any standards an impressive set of scalps, although it is less the identity of the batsmen than the manner in which he celebrates their downfall that has endeared him to the English public; whirling dervishes are less animated than Panesar when he takes a wicket.
In Sri Lanka, on turning pitches prepared for Muttiah Muralitharan, there will doubtless be more of the euphoric high-fiving. Not that he is counting any chickens, let alone wickets. "They [the Sri Lankan batsmen] are very skilful players of spin," he says. "It will be very testing for me. But it's really exciting. I'll be bugging Michael Vaughan a lot. He's toured Sri Lanka before and he's a great player of spin. He's scored a hundred against Murali, so I'll be picking his brain all the time. I hope he doesn't get annoyed. I'll be bugging him so much."
Panesar still has limited experience of Vaughan's captaincy; it was Andrew Flintoff who held the reins at the start of his Test career and Flintoff who told him, in the team meeting the evening before the first Test against India in Nagpur in March 2006, that he was going to make his debut the following day. In his book he recalls, sweetly, that he went straight back to his room, lay on the bed with his eyes closed and whispered to himself again and again that he was about to play cricket for England. He then found some sheets of paper and started marking down the fielding positions he wanted for each batsman. These he took along the corridor to Flintoff's room. In the book he records the captain's response.
"When I knocked on Flintoff's door and handed over the results he seemed a bit bemused. 'This is what I'm thinking of doing,' I said. 'Ah, OK,' he replied, sounding as puzzled as he looked. 'No worries at all, mate. I'll take it on board and you have a good night's sleep.' I decided I ought to leave quickly because I wasn't sure whether he wanted me in his room."
Vaughan, I suppose, might have been less thrown by the debutant's uncommon diligence. "He is different to the other captains I've had," Panesar says. "He sets different fields. Like for example, he has two men on the drive. Normally you will have an extra cover and a drive man. He has a drive man and an extra cover as a drive man. When I bowled at Trent Bridge to Dravid, he pushed one out and got caught at extra cover on the drive. That shows Michael Vaughan's thinking. It's amazing. Sometimes I'll be thinking, 'I want a gully', and I'll turn round and he's already got a gully in. I have total faith in what he says. Blind faith."
The 25-year-old is plainly sincere in his wide-eyed admiration for the most accomplished of his team-mates and the disbelief that he belongs in their orbit is diminishing only gradually. As for the adulation that he gets from the fans, it is hard to imagine him ever taking it as his due.
"It has been unbelievable," he says. "I treasure it, because it doesn't happen to everyone. When I'm fielding, I turn around and see people with fake beards and bandannas. So much warmth and love. I enjoy every minute of it."
I ask him whether he has occasionally felt in danger of becoming a figure of fun? After all, it is not every cricketer whose autobiography contains a reference in the index to catches, dropped. It is a subject covered on pages 39, 105-106, 109, 111, 112, 114, 123, 124, 127 and 140. Catches, held, by contrast, gets only page 112. And here is his description of a skier not so much dropped as mislaid in Mumbai's Wankhede Stadium.
"I ran forward, looked up and saw a bit of sky, a lot of sun, but no red dot. Eventually I spotted the ball... And then I lost it again... I put my hands where I thought the ball would come down, held them there and felt nothing. I've read that it landed between two feet and three metres to my right."
He has been working hard, he tells me, to excise such moments of comic haplessness from his game. "I'm doing a lot of catching stuff with [the England coach] Peter Moores and [team analyst] Mark Garroway. We use these new fusion bats, which has a kind of cushioning on the bat and sends the ball so much higher than a normal bat. I'm getting closer [to becoming a decent fielder, I think he means, not to the descending ball]. But I'm not a natural athlete. I know it's something I need to keep working on."
Let's turn to what he is very good at already: orthodox left-arm spin. I ask whether he has developed a doosra (the off-spinner's delivery that turns from leg to off) for the Sri Lankan tour, in honour of its greatest exponent, Murali? He laughs delightedly, showing perfect, preternaturally white teeth.
"No, I haven't tried bowling the doosra. It will take time. It has taken Muralitharan time. It's good to have a doosra, definitely. But you can work on some new things so much that you forget what you've already got." Which is what? "An orthodox stock ball, with different variations of pace and different angles at the crease." Is there no secret weapon, then, like Murali's doosra or Shane Warne's flipper? He chuckles again; he appears to have forgotten his rowing-boat tribulations. "Not unless you know something I don't..."
There must have been times, though, when he has breached a batsman's defence by sheer guile, outwitting him? "To be honest, I'm still learning to really outwit batsmen. I'm not there yet, not like Shane Warne, bowling off stump, off stump, off stump, then slider ... lbw."
Panesar's modesty becomes him, but he is a fellow, I remind him, with 10 wickets in a Test match to his credit. "Yes, well, the man upstairs helps out, a few blessings from him. All I do is bowl stock ball, stock ball, stock ball, with little variations of pace. Outwitting a batsman is a different skill and I'm still only 25, which is pretty young for a spinner.
"I wouldn't say I've ever outwitted a batsman. If the ball kicks a bit more at pace and there's a chance for a bat/pad [catch], I might move a fielder close to get a bat/pad, but I think outwitting batsmen is a different kettle of fish. Bowling wide, wide, wide, then hitting off stump with the arm ball, that's an amazing skill, such a subtle art. David Parsons [England's spin-bowling coach] is helping me with that."
Is there anyone whose repertoire he covets? "Daniel Vettori; if I could be half as good as him ... or Bishan Bedi, you know. My father has talked a lot about him. His flight, his smoothness of action, all that artistry."
He considers the best spinner he has ever faced, however, to be Warne. "He makes you wait between deliveries, and you just feel his presence. In Sydney I came out as a nightwatchman, and Kevin Pietersen said to me 'Watch out for his slider, he'll beat you lbw with the slider'. He tossed it wide, wide, wide, then the slider came. Such a skill he has. Amazing."
There is a lovely story in Panesar's book about an episode during the third Test in Perth last year, when, while batting against Warne, he got so excited about picking the googly that he shouted "Googly" as the ball travelled towards him. The Aussie fielders made hay. "You're finished Warney, Monty's sussed you out," called Ricky Ponting. But when the series was finished, Warne sat with Panesar in the Australian dressing room at the Sydney Cricket Ground, sharing his insights into the art of spin. "I was a little bit afraid to ask him," Panesar tells me. "But Terry Jenner [Warne's coach] was in there, and I know him a bit, so I said, 'Do you think he'll talk to me?' He talked for about half an hour. He's a great, great man."
Panesar is endearingly eager to heap praise on all spin bowlers bar himself. He admits to studying Phil Tufnell scrupulously and adopting some of his methods. It's a good job, I venture, that he did not also adopt Tufnell's famously relaxed work ethic. Nobody will ever be able to criticise Panesar for not putting in the hours. On which subject, does he think it fair to conclude that his Sikhism, and the self-control it entails, has intensified his discipline as a cricketer?
"For me, religion is a faith and cricket is a dream; they are separate," he says, with a frown. Nonetheless, the discipline of teetotalism, for example, must be useful for a sportsman? Especially in the light of certain revelations about England cricketers getting tanked up.
"Any religion gives a sense of discipline," he says, impassively, "and that helps in cricket, just as the discipline in cricket helps in religion. They complement each other." He does not disapprove of occasional carousing on tour, he insists. "There is nothing wrong with a drink. We all want to enjoy ourselves sometimes, but it is not good in anything to go overboard." Especially in a rowing boat on the Thames, I almost add, but think better of it.
'Monty's Turn – Taking My Chances' by Monty Panesar is published by Hodder & Stoughton, priced £18.99
I'm delighted to send my warmest greetings to everyone in our Hindu and Sikh communities on the auspicious occasion of Diwali.
Diwali is such a wonderful inclusive festival, which reaches beyond your communities to people of many backgrounds all over the world. The symbolic lighting of lamps, representing life, hope and new beginnings sends a powerful message of unity and peace to us all.
I know that Diwali is a special time for families, who come together to celebrate and reflect on the year gone by.
And it also gives me an opportunity to recognise and reflect on the huge contribution made by British Hindu and Sikh communities to our country's prosperity and our culture. Your involvement in every sphere of our national life is something we can all immensely be proud of.
Once again, my very best wishes for a joyous occasion.
A Sikh teenager has been suspended from school for refusing to remove a religious bangle.
The parents of Sarika Singh, 14, are now considering a legal challenge against the school, a girls’ comprehensive school in Aberdare, South Wales, that taught the girl “in isolation” for nine weeks before excluding her.
Jane Rosser, the headmistress of Aberdare Girls’ School, said that the code of conduct permitted only two items of jewellery, a watch and a pair of plain metal stud earrings. The school bans all visible religious symbols, including Christian crosses and Muslim headscarves.
Miss Singh has won the backing of the Valleys Race Equality Council and her parents are now considering a challenge in the High Court.
The metal bangle, called a kara, is one of five items all Sikhs are expected to wear. It is supposed to be a visual reminder to do only good work with the hands. Miss Singh, who has been suspended for five days, began wearing it two years ago after a family visit to India, but the school took action only in September.
Her mother, Sanita Singh, said: “Sarika told us, ‘I don’t go to school any more, I go to prison’.”
Ian Blake, chairman of the school’s governing body, said: “We made our decision only after prolonged research into the previous stated cases across the UK, interrogation of the law, including human rights and race relations legislation.” The governors have rejected an appeal.
The mother of a 14-year-old Sikh girl is planning a legal challenge after her daughter was excluded from her school for wearing a religious wrist bangle.
Sarika Singh was sent home by the school after she refused to remove her silver Kara bangle as she felt it was “a constant reminder to do good.”
Aberdare Girls School in south Wales said it had a clear code of conduct and it had temporarily excluded a pupil for refusing to accept a ruling from the governors.
Jane Rosser, the head teacher, said that wearing the Kara was against regulations because it was a piece of jewellery.
The only two forms of jewellery that girls were allowed to wear in school were a wrist watch and one pair of plain metal stud earrings.
However the Sikh girl's supporters claimed the school's decision infringed her human rights.
The girl's mother Sanita Singh, 38, said she was taking legal advice and was considering seeking a judicial review.
She had the support of several local politicians and the Sikh Federation UK, she added.
She said the teenager would remove the bangle for gym classes, or wood and metalwork, for safety reasons.
She added: “It is not jewellery. It is part of our faith and symbol of our belief.”
She added: “We feel very strongly that Sarika has a right to manifest her religion. She is not asking for anything big and flashy, she is not making a big fuss, she just wants a reminder of her religion.”
Her daughter's interest in the Sikh faith intensified after the family visited India, including the Golden Temple in Amritsar, two years ago.
"I don't believe in putting pressure on children to follow a certain religion, but Sarika decided for herself that she wanted to be a practising Sikh,” Mrs Singh, a mother-of-two, added.
Sarika, of Cwmbach, near Aberdare, said: “I am a Sikh and it is very important for me to wear the Kara because it is a symbol of my faith and a constant reminder that I should only do good work, and never do anything bad, with my hands.
“It is a comfort to me and a confidence booster when I am doing my exams. The reason I am fighting for my right to wear the Kara is because I want to stand up for the right of all the other Sikh pupils across the country to wear their Karas in school.The governors rejected the girl's request to wear the bangle after examining the uniform policy and human rights legislation in detail.
The family has been backed by the Valleys Race Equality Council, whose director is the former Welsh Secretary Ron Davies.
He said: “We have arranged for her to see a solicitor and an application will be made to the High Court for a judicial review of the school's decision.
“We believe the school is acting in contravention both of the 1976 Race Relations Act and of human rights legislation.”
A leading member of the Sikh community and a south Wales AM have spoken in support of a 14-year-old excluded from school for wearing a religious bangle.
Sarika Singh has been temporarily excluded after Aberdare Girls School said her bangle or Kara broke its code of conduct, aimed at ensuring equality.
The secretary of Sikh Federation UK said the Kara was an article of faith and the school was breaking the law.
Leanne Wood AM said she was "surprised" by the school's decision.
Governors said they had made their decision after significant study of the legal background.
Sarika Singh was excluded for a day on Monday, and on Tuesday her mother said she was told she had been excluded for a fixed period.
Sarika has said of wearing the bangle: "It's very important to me, it constantly reminds me to do good and not to do bad, especially with my hands."
Jagtar Singh from the Sikh Federation UK claimed the school was breaching the 1976 Race Relations Act.
He said: "The department for education and schools in England have said that if a head teacher or governing body were to deny a Sikh child one of their articles of faith such as the bangle then they would be breaking the law.
"If you are a practising Sikh, you have no choice, you have to have the Kara. It is the one symbol that virtually every single Sikh wears."
Sarika's mother Sinita Singh has said the teenager would remove the bangle for gym classes, or wood and metalwork, for safety reasons.
She has spoken of her intention to take legal advice, saying: "She's not asking for anything big and flashy, she's not making a big fuss, she just wants a reminder of her religion."
Governors rejected Sarika's request to wear the bangle after a "significant period of research", examining the uniform policy and human rights legislation in detail.
When she continued to wear the bangle to classes, Sarika was excluded by head teacher Jane Rosser.
Ms Rosser said the school's strict code of conduct had been in place for many years and had been established to ensure equality.
She said: "The code clearly states the only two forms of jewellery that girls are allowed to wear in school is a wrist watch and one pair of plain metal stud earrings."
Ian Blake, chair of the school's governing body said the school continually reviewed the code to reflect the population of the school and its surrounding community.
"The fact remains the code has to be upheld and we made our decision only after a significant period of research into previous cases across the UK, interrogation of the law, including human rights and race relations legislation and seeking legal guidance from the Local Education Authority," he said.
'Discrimination issues'
South Wales Central AM Leanne Wood called for the assembly governnment to issue clear guidance for schools about pupils wearing religious symbols.
She said: "I'm surprised and disappointed at the decision of Aberdare Girl's School to exclude Sarika, and I've yet to be convinced that they've got a good reason for doing so."
A Welsh Assembly Government spokesperson said there was no legislation in place specifically covering school uniforms, and whether a school's policy unlawfully breaches the Race Relations Act 1976 was a matter for the courts.
The spokesperson added: "School uniform and appearance issues including the wearing of jewellery, are local matters for individual schools to decide upon.
"The Welsh Assembly Government will shortly be issuing guidance on a range of issues associated with school uniform policies and the wearing of school uniform including equality, health and safety and discrimination issues."
BEAUTIFUL paintings, colourful clothing and informative displays were among the many exhibits seen by the many visitors to an exhibition depicting the fascinating world of Sikhism.
Scores of school pupils and residents have viewed the collection being shown at Sri Guru Singh Sabha Gurdwara temple, in Newark Road, Fengate, Peterborough.
The exhibition was opened by chief exective of Peterborough City Council Gillian Beasley during a special ceremony attended by a host of city dignitaries including leader of the city council John Peach, Cllr John Holdich and Cllrs John and Judy Fox, and former chairman of Peterborough Race Equality Commission Harmesh Lakhanpaul.
Also attending the event were representatives from the Royal Anglian Regiment whose soldiers, many of whom have recently returned from serving in Afghanistan, were urging young Sikhs to choose the Army as a career option.
Sikhism in Peterborough has only a relatively short history. It started when a dozen Sikh families moved to the city to find work in the city’s brick factories in 1970, and a temple was soon built in Cromwell Road.
But as Peterborough has grown in the last 35 years, so has the Sikh community, and today there are more than 1,000 Sikhs living in the city, who worship at temples in Royce Road and Fengate.
The exhibition has been prepared by the Kohinoor Project Trust, a Leicester-based voluntary group which is supported by The National Lottery’s Awards for All scheme and Peterborough City Council.
It also received extensive help from the Punjabi Indian Community Association in Peterborough, and its president Ram Singh Kalra said it was proving a huge success so far.
Mr Kalra said: “We have had lots of schoolchildren coming in to look around the temple. We even had a group from Sleaford, in Lincolnshire, who were overwhelmed by it all.
“We want to make sure people know all about our religion and this is a great way of doing so.
Sikhs like to help people and welcome people from all walks of life. “A problem we do have is a perception that we are linked with the Taliban. Of course, this is not the case, and hopefully this festival will help get rid of this misconception.”
Visitors are able to make chapattis – a traditional Punjabi food – and also learn about other traditional recipes during their visit. They can also learn about the traditional Sikh costumes such as turban tying and trying on Punjabi suits.
Mr Kalra added: “This was a huge success, and I was told that the regiment (Royal Anglians) got a good response from the Sikhs who looked at their exhibition.”
The festival continues until November 25, to celebrate the birthday of the founder of Sikhism, Guru Nanak Dev Ji.
n Group visits can still be arranged by calling 01733 562048 or 01733 324594. For more information, visit www.sikhwebsite.com
WASHINGTON (Map, News) - A Sikh civil rights group has filed a complaint with Fairfax County police after an officer allegedly used a religious slur to justify searching a man outside of a Centreville bar.
The complaint, filed last week, stems from an Oct. 5 dispute between Inderpal Singh Chawla and a bouncer at O’Tooles Restaurant Pub and Billiards. It alleges Chawla was turned away from the establishment after refusing to remove his turban. During the confrontation, a patron commented that he “probably has a bomb on his head,” according to the complaint. A nearby officer then told Chawla to “turn around and put his hands on the wall,” according to the document.
“Mr. Chawla responded ‘are you serious?’ To which the police officer stated, ‘Yes, apparently you have a bomb on your head,’ ” the complaint said.
The officer is not named in the Oct. 24 complaint, filed by the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund. Fairfax County police have begun an administrative investigation into the group’s claim, said Lt. Chris Marsh, commander of the department’s internal affairs investigations division. Marsh would not comment on specifics of the case. The review, he said, could take as long as 60 to 90 days.
“We have a strict policy against any sort of racial or religious discrimination. We take it very seriously,” he said. “This case will be investigated as thoroughly as possible.”
But neither side has been able to identify the officer, which could complicate any investigation. The Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund was able to describe the officer only as a “white male,” according to Marsh.
The inability to name him “doesn’t inspire any confidence in us that the investigation is going to go well,” said Rajbir Singh Datta, the group’s national director. The department receives a “tremendous number of baseless complaints,” though all are taken seriously, said Marshall Thielen, president of the county’s police union. Thielen said he was not familiar with Chawla’s case. Practicing Sikh men refrain from cutting their beards or hair, which is often wrapped and covered with a turban.
Neither Chawla nor the owner of O’Tooles Restaurant Pub and Billiards could be reached forhttp://www.examiner.com/a-
A delegation of British Sikhs this week demanded in parliament that they should be permitted to carry their ceremonial dagger, the Kirpan, through security checks at the European Parliament, at Windsor Castle, the London Eye and other places protected by tight security.
The delegation met the All Party Parliamentary Group for UK Sikhs and told them in a briefing document: “The Passport Office, Immigration Offices, Driving Standards Agency offices, some schools, London Eye, Windsor Castle etc. are all operating security policies without conducting a proper evidence-based risk analysis regarding the Sikh Kirpan. Institutions such as the European Parliament and the UN Human Rights Council have also denied practising Sikhs from the UK the right to meet elected representatives in person in Brussels or raise issues about religious freedoms in Geneva. Practising Sikhs are therefore being denied free access to public places in the UK and elsewhere, unless they are prepared to compromise their religious identity.”
The Sikh delegation insisted that the dagger was an essential “article of faith” that all observant Sikhs must carry. The Government had promised to create a code of practice that would offer guidance on this matter, but had so far not come up with it. Since 9/11 the situation had changed dramatically.
Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society, said: “This is utterly ridiculous. I was stopped and interrogated at an airport in the United States because I had omitted to remove a very small corkscrew from my hand baggage. I had forgotten it was in there and, of course, gave it up instantly it was detected on the x-ray machine. The idea that a large dagger could be permitted on air liners or in places such as parliamentary buildings that are prime targets for terrorists is completely crazy. Don’t these people know that knives were used to hijack the planes that were used in the attack on New York?
Mr Sanderson continued: “Who is to say that once such an item is through security it can’t be stolen and misused or even that its owner might have malign intentions. This is taking the religious symbols argument way too far – and those requesting this exemption are quite obviously looking to create a confrontation in which they can once again portray themselves as victims of discrimination. They may well find that on this occasion it will backfire on them.
“They claim to want equality. If that’s true, then they shouldn’t demand ‘rights’ that are denied to everyone else on the planet.” 2 November 2007
A GROUP of 15 Sikhs from Slough joined 150 others lobbying 25 politicians, including Slough MP Fiona Mactaggart, at the houses of Parliament on Tuesday.
The group raised issues concerning human rights in Punjab and a possible code of practice covering Sikh articles of faith to ensure their rights in public places.
The group also held a candlelit vigil for the 20,000 Sikh victims of the pogroms of November 1984 in Parliament Square
Allegations of financial irregularities in the Metropolitan (Met) Police's Sikh Association are being investigated.
The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) launched the inquiry after concerns were raised that members' funds may have been misused.
The Met's directorate of professional standards (DPS), which is responsible for collecting evidence in such cases, said the association co-operated fully.
Accounts, reports and meeting minutes were handed to the IPCC on Monday.
IPCC commissioner Nicola Williams said: "The Metropolitan Police Sikh Association has made allegations of potentially serious conduct matters that must be investigated.
"We will use the services of an experienced accountant to assist our independent investigators.
"I will ensure that the investigation is proportionate and fair to everybody involved."
FIREFIGHTERS are urging Hindu, Jain and Sikh communities celebrating Diwali next Friday to follow simple fire safety guidelines.
Candle fires increase by more than a third during Diwali and over 20 per cent of deaths caused by candles occur at this time.
Mark Cashin, Cheshire's deputy chief fire officer responsible for community risk reduction, said: "It is ironic and tragic that during periods of celebration there is a dramatic increase in the number of fires among many communities.
"It's often that safety comes second to celebration.
"Our aim is to make communities more aware of their surroundings and ensure that they are actively thinking about fire safety in the home."
The Fire Service is asking people to ensure they have a working smoke alarm fitted in their homes.
To book a free Home Safety Assessment including the free fitting of smoke alarms call 0800 3890053.
HYDERABAD: The Sikh community of the twin cities on Sunday celebrated the 473rd birth anniversary of the fourth Sikh Guru, Guru Ramdasji, who built the famous Harimandir Sahibji, popularly known as Golden Temple, at Amritsar.
The festival was marked with fervour and devotion. Prayers to Guru Granth Sahibji and recitation of Gurubani Keertans were followed by a colourful holy procession.
The main celebration was organised under the aegis of the Prabhandak Committee, Gurudwara Sahib, Ramdas Nagar,Rehmathnagar where Sikh devotees took part in ‘Vishaal Deewan’ (mass congregation) held near the Gurudwara Sahib premises.
Gurubani Keertans were recited by renowned Ragi Jathas specially invited from various parts of the country. Later, Guru-ka-Langar was served to the devotees.
In the evening, Nagar Keertan was taken out from Gurudwara Sahib Rehmathnagar to Gurudwara Sahib Ameerpet.
Guru Granth Sahebji was carried on a decorated vehicle along with ‘Nishaan Saheban’. Shabad Keertans were rendered by the Keerathani Jathas and Sikh youths displayed ‘‘Gatka’ skills.
As the son of Punjabi immigrants, I was not surprised to read a report from the Financial Services Authority showing that among Britain’s major faith groups, Hindus and Sikhs are the best at making ends meet. Of course they are! They never go on holiday. They never eat out. And they haggle over everything: I spent my childhood being dragged around Wolverhampton as my mother bartered over everything from secondhand sofas to sultanas.
I kept the most excruciating of these memories suppressed until I read the results of another study this week, showing that most business negotiators are bad at bargaining. Researchers divided 266 Chicago MBA students into either buyers representing a motorcycle maker, or sales reps for a parts supplier. After three negotiations lasting 45 minutes each, they compared the deals that had been struck against the limits that the teams had decided in advance and found that each side had underestimated how much the other was willing to give away.
While these Chicago MBAs may have been bad at haggling, they at least tried, which is more than can be said for most British people. Apparently only two out of five British consumers ever try to barter and failing to haggle when buying a new car costs British consumers £512 million a year. Research has found that one of the reasons why women get paid less for doing the same jobs as men is that they are less likely to try to negotiate pay rises.
Are Brits simply too embarrassed to haggle? Or do they just not know how to do it? In case it is the latter, I thought I would provide a four-point Punjabi guide to haggling, the basic principles of which, I would argue, are applicable to negotiations everywhere, from the boardroom, to the corporate purchasing department, to your local branch of Greggs:
Three young Sikh men who drowned in the Lake District last year died accidentally, an inquest has ruled.
Harvinder Singh, 15, Satvir Singh, 17, and Tajinder Singh, 21, all from Wolverhampton, died in Ullswater in September 2006.
The three were paddling on a trip with a martial arts group in Cumbria when one of them slipped.
An inquest into their deaths was held in Kendal, in Cumbria, on Wednesday morning.
Coroner Ian Smith praised the actions of bystanders who stepped in and tried to save them.
The inquest heard that a total of 26 young men had been in the water at the time recreating a Sikh dipping ceremony.
Safety notices
Several others were pulled out unconscious from the lake.
Mr Smith said that without the intervention of the onlookers, more of the young men could have died.
A joint statement released by the families after the hearing said that it had been a tragic accident and they hoped other people would learn from what happened.
Mr Smith said that the stretch of water was a hazardous one, and ideally needed safety notices placed around it to warn people of hidden dangers.
However, he said as it was so large, at 20 miles (32.2km) long, it would be impractical.
NEW YORK -- Sikh children facing harassment can find resources for help from a new website, reports India Journal. "Khalsakids.org” was launched after it was found that 75 percent of Sikh students in Queens in New York City face some kind of harassment, usually because of religious symbols they wear like the turban. The Sikh Coalition has launched the site to help Sikh children find others of their age to chat with. Teachers are invited to use the site to find out more about Sikhism. The site also documents hate crimes against Sikh children.
Saturday, 20 October 2007, 2:39 pm Press Release: Caritas People of all faiths to gather to Pray for Burma
October 20, 2007
Buddhists, Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs and people of all faiths and spiritualities will join in solidarity with the people of Burma this Sunday October 21st.
“Following the recent upheavals in Burma, led by courageous monks and nuns, Australians will come together for a day of cultural celebration and reflection. They are responding to an invitation issued by the National Council of Churches in Australia and Caritas Australia to participate in a National Day of Prayer for Burma”, said Jack de Groot, Caritas Australia’s CEO.
“Around the country, faith communities will include special prayers for the people of Burma during their weekend services,” Mr de Groot said.
An interfaith gathering will be held in Sydney’s Martin Place. Buddhist monks will commence the main event with incantations, followed by a cultural reflection of dance and traditional music.
Leaders of major faiths in Australia will then lead a prayer or reflection from their respective traditions in remembrance of those people affected by the brutal Burmese regime. A silent procession to St James Church in Phillip St will follow and culminate in Hyde Park with a symbolic water ritual of solidarity for the people of Burma.
Participants will create a wave of red as they dress in a colour to express solidarity with the monks and nuns who have been killed, injured and interred following their courageous calls for an end to oppression in their country.
NEW DELHI (AP) India's government has failed to fully investigate and prosecute officials who allegedly took part in thousands of killings and disappearances during a counterinsurgency campaign against separatists in northern India, rights groups said Thursday.
Throughout much of the 1980s and early 1990s, Sikh insurgents waged a brutal campaign to establish their own country in India's Punjab state, massacring civilians, bombing crowded markets and attacking Hindus. India's security forces responded by allegedly killing thousands - many of whom were suspected militants, many others later described as innocent. To this day, about 3,000 people remain missing, many after being detained by police.
In a report released Thursday, two rights groups, Human Rights Watch and Ensaaf, a Punjabi group, said India's government had failed to properly investigate the alleged killings and disappearances by the security forces.
The report highlights a long-running investigation by India's National Human Rights Commission into accusations that police killed thousands of people from 1985 to 1995 and secretly cremated the bodies.
The commission, which is investigating the cases at the request of India's Supreme Court, has examined evidence from just three of Punjab's thousands of crematoriums and is only seeking to identify the dead - not who killed them, the rights groups said.
Officials at the National Human Rights Commission were not immediately available for comment, and officials at the Home Ministry, which oversees India's domestic security forces, said they could not comment on the report because they had not yet seen it.
The allegations from Human Rights Watch, based in New York, and Ensaaf, based in Fremont, Calif., are the latest in a series of accusations against security forces in India, a democracy whose leaders say the rule of law prevails.
In Kashmir, a predominantly Muslim Himalayan region that has been wracked by an Islamic insurgency for nearly two decades, police this year began investigating five cases of allegedly staged shootouts in which security personnel are suspected of killing innocents and then claiming they were rebels to earn rewards and promotions.
On Tuesday, a court convicted 10 policemen of murder in the deaths of two businessmen slain in a hail of bullets in downtown New Delhi in 1997. The policemen claimed they had opened fire in self-defense, but the court found the shooting had been an unprovoked attack on a car that the officers believed was carrying a gangster.
There have also been a handful of prosecutions of police accused of excesses during the insurgency in Punjab. But most cases, in Punjab and elsewhere, have slowly faded away.
Sikhs make up just 2 percent of India's 1.1 billion people and are concentrated in Punjab. The insurgency left an estimated 25,000 people dead, including 1,700 police. Since it tapered off in the early 1990s, calls for a separate Sikh state have all but disappeared.
Randeep Ramesh in New Delhi Thursday October 18, 2007The Guardian
The families of thousands of civilians "disappeared" during the Indian government's violent suppression of a campaign for a Sikh homeland more than a decade ago are still waiting for perpetrators of the crimes to be brought to justice, human rights monitors have warned.
In a new report entitled Protecting the Killers, Human Rights Watch says the Indian government needs to "hold accountable members of its security forces who killed and tortured thousands of Sikhs" during counter-insurgency operations in Punjab that ended only in 1995.
By then the unrest, sparked by a call for Khalistan, or a Sikh nation, had lasted more than 10 years. Democracy was suspended as the Indian army occupied the state.
The security forces eventually crushed the Khalistani movement by adopting a "bullet-for-bullet" policy of extra-judicial killings in which more than 40,000 people died. The embers of resentment have not completely burned out: a bomb blast on Sunday in Punjab, which killed seven, was blamed on Sikh separatist groups.
One of the key cases highlighted by Human Rights Watch is that of the mass cremation of 2,097 bodies in Amritsar, the Sikh holy city. The country's human rights commission, civil rights groups say, has for more than a decade failed to investigate a single case of the "mass crematorium" and explicitly refuses to identify any responsible officials.
The scale of the deaths was uncovered by a local civil rights lawyer, Jaswant Singh Kalra, who was later murdered. Five policeman were convicted of abducting and killing Mr Kalra.
His widow, Paramjeet, is still campaigning for the "missing thousands". "It took a decade for these men to be found guilty," she said. "What about the thousands of others?"
Rajinder Bains, a civil rights lawyer in Amritsar, estimated that 25,000 people were "still missing".
"There were 35 police and officials charged but none were prosecuted," he said. "The charges were set aside by the supreme court on technical grounds. The state has the money and the power to protect its own."
Human Rights Watch says India is fostering a "culture of impunity" around its counter-insurgency operations, giving a free hand to its security services to act without supervision.
However, senior Indian officials dismissed the report, describing it as "propaganda worthy of Goebbels". KPS Gill, a former director of police in Punjab during the counter-insurgency, said the New York-based organisation was "ill informed and biased", asking: "Do these people think about the innocents killed by terrorists?"
Mr Gill, who Human Rights Watch claim has led "the attack against the pursuit of justice", said the bodies in the crematorium in Amritsar were those of "beggars, vagrants, possibly some Bangladeshi migrants. In India, unclaimed and unidentified bodies found by the police must, by law, be cremated."
New procedure sensitive to Sikh turban and other religious head coverings
Washington, DC - Oct 16, 2007 (PRN): This afternoon the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) announced a new security screening policy that will go into effect at U.S. airports on October 27 and apply to all religious head coverings. The change is a direct result of collaboration between TSA, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials, the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund (SALDEF) and other Sikh organizations in response to the concerns of the Sikh American community over a procedure implemented on August 4, 2007.
The August 2007 procedure disproportionately targeted Sikhs for secondary screening due to their turban, an article of faith, like the Jewish kippah (yarmulke) and Muslim hijab. The turban is an integral part of the Sikh faith and identity, and removal of the turban in public is akin to a strip search. The procedure resulted in Sikh travelers being forced to undergo an invasive pat-down or removal of the turban.
The turban was the only religious article listed as potentially requiring additional screening. Furthermore, the procedure may have resulted in a misallocation of national security resources due to the heightened focus on Sikh passengers solely because of their religious practice of wearing a turban.
"The new policy is encouraging and addresses most of the concerns of the Sikh American community," said Kavneet Singh, SALDEF's Managing Director. "Our collaboration with TSA has resulted in a solution that strengthens TSA's ability to protect our nation's airports, while also respecting the civil liberties of all travelers of faith. We will continue to work closely with TSA to ensure that the implementation of the new procedure does not result in the inappropriate profiling of Sikhs and other travelers of faith."
Under the new procedure, a Sikh traveler's turban will be accommodated during the screening process by providing additional options to satisfy the security requirements. According to TSA, the revised procedure states:
"TSA will now include the screening procedures for headwear within the overall category of bulky clothing and will not call it out as a separate category. Removal of all headwear is recommended but the rules accommodate those with religious, medical, or other reasons for whom removing items is not comfortable. Transportation security officers have several options for screening passengers who choose not to remove bulky clothing, including headwear."
Additionally, all 43,000 TSA screeners will undergo Sikh cultural awareness training before the Thanksgiving holiday travel season. The trainings will include two tools developed by SALDEF in collaboration with the US Department of Justice:
1. A training video: On Common Ground: Sikh American Cultural Awareness Training for Law Enforcement [watch video]; and 2. A poster called, Common Sikh American Head Coverings [view poster], that TSA is distributing to all 450 airports across the country.
SALDEF thanks TSA Administrator Kip Hawley for his leadership along with officials at TSA and DHS for their collaborative efforts in finding a solution that balances both national security and protects the rights of all travelers going through America's airports.
About SALDEF: Founded in 1996, SALDEF is the nations oldest and largest Sikh American civil rights organization. SALDEF protects and promotes the civil rights of Sikh Americans through legal aid, advocacy and educational outreach. SALDEF's mission is to create a fostering environment in the United States for future generations of Sikh Americans. Sikhism is a distinct religious faith that is over five hundred years old. There are approximately half a million Sikhs living in the United States.
Washington, Oct 17 - Sikh air passengers will no longer have to remove their turbans at US screening checkpoints if doing so makes them uncomfortable under new guidelines coming into force Oct 27. The new Transportation Security Administration (TSA) guidelines announced Tuesday give airport screeners the option to pat down headwear at the metal detector if a passenger does not want to remove it for personal reasons. Experts say mixing up the screening techniques is good security. 'We must use security measures that are unpredictable, agile,' TSA Administrator Kip Hawley told a Senate panel Tuesday. New York based Sikh Coalition, a leading US Sikh civil rights organisation, welcomed the change because it both protects national security and is respectful of religious pluralism. But it also asked the TSA to create safeguards that provide better protection against religious profiling. Under the new policy, a Sikh, or any person wearing religious headwear can pat down his or her own head covering, and then have their hands swabbed with a cotton cloth to check for chemical residue. The new policy is a direct response to Sikh concerns, raised after the TSA in August listed 'bulky' headwear such as cowboy hats, berets or turbans should be patted down. The TSA has now removed turbans from its screener guidance. In addition, the TSA will provide all its field employees with mandatory cultural awareness training about Sikh practices. The Sikh Coalition said it nevertheless remains concerned that screeners have sole discretion to decide when to perform additional screening. Screeners may pull aside passengers for additional screening if they believe the person's head covering to be 'bulky'. 'While the TSA has assured us that trainings and supervisor oversight will stem improper use of this discretion, the Sikh Coalition is unconvinced that this is the best solution,' It said. Asking TSA to collect data with regards to additional screenings in US airports to ensure that screeners are not profiling, the coalition said it was also concerned that Sikh travellers have to assert that they do not want their turbans touched by a screening officer. 'As we understand it, the TSA is not requiring screeners to inform passengers that they have a right to conduct a self-pat-down, although this is the stated policy. 'We are encouraged that the TSA has found a solution that does not single out turbans for additional screening. Indeed, it is possible to secure America's safety and be true to the principles of religious freedom,' said Amardeep Singh, executive director of the Sikh Coalition.
AT least six people were killed and 30 injured today in a suspected bomb attack in a packed cinema hall in northern India, police and witnesses said.
The explosion occurred as hundreds of people - mainly poor migrant workers - were crammed into a theatre in the industrial city of Ludhiana in northern Punjab state to watch the late-night screening of a new Bollywood comedy.
Police officials in Amritsar, the main city in Punjab, put the toll at six dead and around 30 injured, many of them seriously.
"We were watching the film when I suddenly heard a huge blast and I rushed outside. I saw some four or five bodies inside," an unidentified eyewitness told the Hindi-language Aaj Tak news channel.
Indian television news footage showed at least one body lying on the floor of the cinema, which was strewn with shards of broken glass and bloodstains. Shoes and pieces of torn clothing also littered the blast site.
Indian media reports said the likely cause was a bomb attack, although the Home Ministry in New Delhi said it was still "too early" to draw any conclusions.
India has been hit by a wave of unsolved bomb attacks in recent months that officials have blamed on Pakistani-backed Islamic militants. Punjab, however, was also the scene of a bloody Sikh insurgency in the 1980s.
"We are waiting for the state government and the police to give us a report. The situation is being monitored," a Home Ministry official said, adding that forensic teams were examining the blast site.
News reports said most of those in the cinema hall were young labourers from the impoverished northern states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
Security at bus and railway stations and important buildings across the state has been tightened, a Punjab police spokesman said.
The latest blast comes days after two people were killed and nearly a dozen injured on Thursday in a bomb attack near one of India's most revered Islamic shrines in the northern state of Rajasthan.
India sounded a nationwide alert after that attack, which came ahead of Eid al-Fitr, the Muslim festival at the end of the fasting month of Ramadan, today, and the Hindu festival of Dussehra on October 21.
In August, 42 people were also killed in twin blasts in the southern technology hub of Hyderabad, while in May 11 people died when a bomb tore through the city's main mosque.
In February, 68 people were killed when bombs hit the "Friendship Express" linking India and Pakistan - another unexplained attack.
The latest blasts come ahead of a scheduled October 22 meeting in New Delhi of senior Indian and Pakistani officials on efforts to combat cross-border militancy.
India accuses Pakistan of not doing enough to prevent Islamic extremists from using its soil as a springboard to launch attacks, especially in Kashmir where a separatist revolt has claimed more than 44,000 lives since 1989.
Pakistan, which launched peace talks with India in 2004, denies the charge.
However the Press Trust of India news agency said officials were "puzzled" by today's cinema blast, and were "unable to ascertain so far whether is was a resurgence of Sikh militancy or a handiwork of Pakistan-based militant outfits".
Punjab, India's only Sikh-majority state with a population of about 25 million, was wracked by a separatist revolt in the 1980's which claimed thousands of lives.
The unrest was fanned after prime minister Indira Gandhi ordered troops into the Golden Temple at Amritsar to evict a Sikh militant sect in 1984. Gandhi's Sikh bodyguards shot her dead later the same year.
Amritsar, Oct 14 (UNI) The Punjab Government's decision to enact a law to ban private publishing houses from printing, publishing and distributing 'Birs' (copies) of Guru Granth Sahib has forced the state's oldest publishers to halt the publication of the Sikh scripture.
Jeewan Singh, Chattar Singh, a publishing house established in 1880 in the holy city today announced that it was discontinuing the publication of the scripture in view of the decision of the government. The house was the leading publisher of the Guru Granth Sahib after the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC).
The state Cabinet in its meeting on October 10 had given its consent to the framing of a law to ban private publishing houses from printing and distributing the scripture through the promulgation of an Ordinance.
''We have decided not to print or publish the holy book with immediate effect'', Harbhajan Singh, proprietor of the publishing house announced at a press conference here today.
''However we want to know from the state government whether the law will be applicable only for Punjab or will it be enforced in other parts of the country'', he said while pointing out that there were at least 60 odd private publishers of the scripture in the country.
The government's decision had come in the wake of representations received by the Government from various Sikh organisations, including the SGPC, that had demanded a ban on publishing and printing of the scripture by private publishing houses. SGPC president Avtar Singh Makkar had even written a letter to the Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal in this context.
The SGPC chief had contended that unauthorised private printing, publication, storage and distribution of the scripture was hurting the feelings of the Sikh masses and was violative of the Sikh code of conduct (maryada). The SGPC chief had contended that private publishers did not abide by the 'maryada' while publishing and printing the scripture.
The main objection of the SGPC was against the Amritsar based publishing house, Jeewan Singh, Chattar Singh. The owners of this publishing house had even been summoned to the Akal Takht a few years back, when copies discarded due to printing mistakes were recovered from a pile of 'raddi' (scrap).
Two relatives of Harbhajan Singh were recently dragged and beaten inside the Golden Temple by certain hardliners when copies of the scripture published and sold by them were being transported to Delhi. The hardliners had contended that the scripture was not being transported as per the Sikh 'maryada'. http://www.deepikaglobal.com/ENG3_sub.asp?ccode=ENG3&newscode=4808
NEW DELHI: A priest, Dhyan Singh Komal of the Bangla Sahib Gurdwara, was suspended from the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee for flouting the ban on lavish weddings.
With the wedding season just beginning, the DSGMC is monitoring the situation through all its members across the city. While the code came into effect from October 1, heads of gurdwaras and DSGMC members were bound by it from July 28, Singh said.
While only the wedding season will show how far the moral code is executed, some families have already changed their wedding plans.
Harjinder Singh Khanna, who has an electrical goods business and is a member of the DSGMC, was holding his son’s baraat and the pre-wedding dinner at a farmhouse on the evening of November 17. After the committee’s order, Harjinder has now planned a simple affair on the morning of November 18. "I see a lot of sense in the moral code," Singh told Timescity.
Committees comprising 11 members each have been set up in most of the 46 circles that the capital is divided into under the DSGPC to monitor the execution of the resolution. Also, 400-odd boards requesting people to follow the code will be put up at gurdwaras over the next few days.
The code has a six-point agenda. To begin with, it states that marriage ceremonies like the baraat should not be held at night. Pointing out that these days, there are too many functions surrounding the wedding — the sagan, cocktails, the reception — the committee resolved that these should be restricted to a simple wedding ceremony to be held in the gurdwara only and that too preferably, before noon. A day’s wedding is what the code asserts upon, minus liquor and non-vegetarian food.
At the most, a family can hold one more function besides the wedding.
The code also calls upon families to avoid going to weddings which flout the morally binding norms.
The DSGMC had on July 28, after a meeting with heads of about 173 Singh Sabhas from across Delhi, set out the moral code by way of a resolution for the way a Sikh wedding should feel and look minus ostentation. There are over 300 Singh Sabhas in Delhi.
The DSGPC justifies a "simple wedding" as an attempt to curtail the rise in cases of dowry harrassment and female foeticide. While committee president Paramjit Singh Sarna said families would only be persuaded to follow the code, he clarified that those flouting the norms would not get a marriage certificate from the gurdwara. Those who organised baraats in the evening would not be allowed to marry in the gurdwara while members of the gurdwara committee would boycott the wedding, he said.
Last week I wrote about my immigration check/terrorist hijinks at Madeira airport. My refusal to remove my turban seemed to be on the verge of becoming an international incident. I was e-mailed via the SoS website and roundly chastised by a reader who accused me of being uncooperative and of "exacerbating racial tensions" during these trying and febrile times. Just let me be clear about this: I, the innocent, slightly overweight Glaswegian Sikh, have exacerbated racial tensions because I refused to remove my turban? What else am I guilty of? Maybe I should come clean. It was me who suggested that Scotland forgo its independence and sign the Treaty of Union in 1707. It was me who decided invading Iraq was a good idea. And it was me who hurdled the barrier at Celtic Park and cuffed the Milan keeper on Wednesday night.
Keeping it together for India's Partition
I got a call from my son's school in July. A phone call from the school is rarely a good thing. But this was one of those rare occasions when it was. His history teacher had heard a wee documentary series I had made for the wireless looking back on 60 years of the partitioning of India and he wondered whether I might just pop in and have a wee chat about it. No worries, I thought. A wee chat with what I imagined to be half a dozen A-Level history students; there'd probably be a glass of wine and a curly sandwich.
All was well and good until I checked out the school website a few days before the chat to find out that it was in fact billed as a lecture; but no ordinary lecture: the Richard Dimbleby Inaugural Lecture. It was to be delivered in front of 150 students and guests. And that's how I spent my Wednesday evening, nervously trying to seem knowledgeable hoping that the spirit of Mr Dimbleby senior was otherwise engaged.
Let's grasp the thistle at the Stade de France
Some hours after you read this I shall be sat in the Stade de France in my best kilt, over-sized sporran and darkest blue turban waiting for the hairs on the back of my neck to make themselves known as we prepare to go into battle. I then will be on the pitch (spiritually at any rate) joining the wall of blue, white and thistle as we get in among the Pumas and try to cause an upset at the Rugby World Cup.
My friend Andy called me and asked if I was Scottish enough to be interested in going to the game; he had a spare ticket. Scottish enough? It led me to ponder degrees of Scottishness. Are the Proclaimers more Scottish than me because they sing in a Scottisher accent? With my Glaswegian burr am I Scottisher than Alastair Mackenzie, once Monarch of all our Glens, who sounds like an Englishman even though he was born and brought up in Perthshire? And what about Archie Gemmill or Annie Lennox or Alex Salmond? Are they the Scottishest of the lot?
How do you convey what you feel about your nationality? It's a strange one. I interviewed some people in the British National Party a few years back. Bless them. I was offered the leader of the youth wing of the party, a boy barely old enough to shave, who had decided that Britain was solely for the use and enjoyment of the ethnically white. I was more than happy to help him enforce his policy if the rest of us could have Australia, America and South Africa back.
Anyway, I asked this lad whether he regarded me as Scottish. Obviously I feel very Indian, but I grew up in Scotland. He was quite firm in his opinion that I could never be Scottish. Ever. This was because I was not ethnically Scottish.
This lad from the BNP was not for moving. I tried to explain to him that even if my skin and my ancestry are not "Scottish", my heart and my soul are. I cannot control the quickening of my heart when I hear 'Flower Of Scotland'; I have no ability to stop my soul yearning for the Highlands when I hear the pipes played; I cannot stop shedding a tear when I watch Braveheart and Mel Gibson is on the rack.
(Incidentally the wee boy from the BNP said he would have been left cold by the prospect of an evening of chicken dhansak, aloo gobi and a peshwari naan all hand-served by Beyoncé Knowles and Halle Berry. Maybe he didn't like curry.)
I'm gladdened by the new dawn in the politics of a contemporary, SNP-skewed Scotland. The nation has never felt so inclusive, never felt so forward-looking, never felt so exciting. And I have never been so proud to be a Scot. I feel part of our future in a way I could only have dreamt of as I grew up.
Now all we have to do is send the Argentinians home tae think again. One dream at a time...
Musician who'll never sell his sole
My pal Neale has changed my life a little. We were having a battle of the singer/songwriters the other day, each championing different artists. I had made a convincing case for KT Tunstall and the Cowboy Junkies, when he uttered two words to me: Ray LaMontagne. Neale gave me the first album, Trouble. Now, in the old days, you would buy someone a CD and hand it to them or else purchase a voucher that they could redeem themselves. In this instance the album was purchased and gifted in a completely virtual way: the wonder of the interweb. This wholly modernistic approach to music buying couldn't have juxtaposed more sharply with the nature of the record itself. Having heard a song by Stephen Stills, LaMontagne quit his job making shoes in a factory and started touring. Five years later he had 10 songs and recorded Trouble in two weeks in Los Angeles. The album was done on the cheap with the producer playing most of the instruments, the painfully shy LaMontagne offering his fragile vocal to the mix. And flawed and raw as it is, it does what all truly great music does: it offers tragedy and beauty. For once in my life I am happy that there are fewer shoes in the world.
Take note, Mr Cameron
David Cameron's speech to the Tory conference was done without referring to notes. Can you remember anything he actually said in this script-free event? No, me neither; but I will never forget that he spoke without notes. Because last week everyone kept banging on about it. Call me old-fashioned, but I'm not sure that's such a big deal. I'd hope that the prospective leader of one of the world's most influential countries might be able to have the vision to know what he believed in without needing to be reminded.
Catherine Bennett Thursday October 4, 2007The Guardian
Alone among practitioners of world religions active in this country, Buddhists enjoyed, until this week, the distinction of not having tried to ban anything. The Christians did for Jerry Springer. Sikhs took against Bezhti. Muslims, following up their historic success with the Rushdie fatwa, forced the suppression of the Danish cartoons, are standing firm against Brick Lane and reported to be extra busy this week, trying to banish disrespectful atheists from Facebook. Not to be left out, Hindus finally got their own censorship act together, a couple years ago, with a successful protest against some Christmas stamps that were - one forgets - too Christmassy, or too Hindu, and subsequently saw off an entire exhibition of paintings by MF Husain, India's most renowned artist. They complained that his "offensive paintings of Hindu gods and goddesses in sexual poses have caused outrage over the years amongst Hindus around the world". After threats of violence, Husain's gallery, Asia House, closed the show down.
Admittedly, Buddhists do not seem to have been challenged to the same degree. They have not been ridiculed in musicals or scandalised by popular Booker-shortlisted novels depicting their womenfolk as fractious. But, this week, police in Norwich were called after local Buddhists spotted a Buddha in a gallery window, whose lap area had been disrespectfully customised by the artist, Colin Self, with genitals composed of a pair of shining eggs and a vertical golden banana. Anyone who visited the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition this year will probably remember it. "We have had a complaint in respect of the prominent exhibition of this statue on the basis that it causes religious offence," reported a police officer. "We have liaised with the management of the gallery in order to reach a solution which both upholds the principles of freedom of artistic expression but also prevents any offence being caused to any general member of the public or faith group."
But the police solution - to turn the figure round, so that the banana and eggs could offend only those faith groups actually in the gallery - did not satisfy the gallery owner with whom he had liaised, David Koppel. He said an officer told him, "in no uncertain terms, that if I turned the sculpture around again to face the window he would be coming to arrest me and the sculpture may be destroyed".
From what one understands of the Buddhist perspective, calling in the police might seem to conflict with a conviction that all existence is filled with suffering. Moreover, for practitioners of a creed in which karma generally counts for more, in the long run, than the artistic judgment of DS Ian Fox, of Norwich's Hate Crime unit, you might think it would be a simple matter to cross the street, look the other way, and await the torments of Colin Self when what goes around finally comes around. But it is unfair, of course, to characterise a religion by the behaviour of its most censorious members. Many more tolerant Buddhists must have uncomplainingly endured the sight of this same Buddha, with its eye-catching banana, when it was on show at the Royal Academy, alongside two companion sculptures - Christ on an aeroplane-shaped cross, and Ganesh wearing a Nazi helmet. On the other hand, it might be that would-be censors, visiting the academy, suspected that to complain about the images would be to act out the intentions of their maker, Colin Self, who had entitled the piece, A Trilogy: The Iconoclasts. In Norwich this week, David Koppel said, "I think Colin has been proved right. This is exactly what he is saying. Religion causes arguments. People are so predictable."
Koppel also objected that, recently, when he himself called the police for more orthodox, crime-related reasons, the Norwich constabulary reacted with indifference. "But offend the Buddhists and the police are there." The police might reasonably respond that while they are often unsuccessful in catching thieves, removing a potentially offensive banana from display gives them a chance of earning the respect of the local Buddhist community.
It is debatable, however, whether our overstretched police have the manpower, even with their new hand-held computers, for the kind of intensive artistic supervision that is rapidly becoming necessary, as religious communities outdo one another with claims to special protection. What happens when Norwich's Hindus see Self's Ganesh? Even if complaints from religious groups are already leading to widespread self-censorship by individuals and organisations who prefer to avoid persecution, and thus help save police time, there will always be some inadvertently offensive work, or more deliberate piece of mischief requiring investigation, prior to the issue of a ban, or special guidance, which as the Norfolk Inquisition puts it, "upholds the principles of freedom of artistic expression but also prevents any offence being caused ..."
If this enforced prevention of offence is not to be the monopoly of large religious groups, particularly those able to support their demands with the threat of violence, or yet more effectively, a global death sentence, the time has surely come to formalise arrangements with the appointment of some sort of official censor, tasked with extending rights of artistic suppression impartially, to all. Something like the old lord chamberlains, but much more so. Though diligent enemies of artistic freedom, the activities of those busybodies, stipulating when a character should keep his vest on, and so on, seem feeble, looking back, compared with the unpredictable demands of our various faith groups backed, where necessary, by officers from the local hate-crime unit.
· This week Catherine read Mohsin Hamid's The Reluctant Fundamentalist: "Ingeniously done - and just about survives the presence of one of literature's most irritating love interests." Catherine also read newspaper extracts from Eric Clapton's autobiography, "which, given the state they were in, cross-refs wonderfully with those just published by his ex-wife, Pattie Boyd"
A once controversial new law making it an offence to incite religious hatred is coming into force.
The law closes a gap in race legislation that meant only Jews and Sikhs, who were deemed by the courts to be racial groups, were protected.
Other groups like Muslims and Christians were considered to be religious rather than racial so were thought not to have the same protection under the law.
Anyone convicted of the offence, which follows the introduction of the Racial and Religious Hatred Act, faces up to seven years in jail.
When first proposed the legislation was heavily criticised by some groups who believed it could outlaw people such as comedians making jokes at religion's expense.
Blackadder star Rowan Atkinson was among those who warned that such measures
risked undermining the freedom of satirists, comedians and writers, and legitimate discussion about religion and religious practices.
There were two attempts by the Government to introduce it, first in 2001 and then later with the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act. They faltered because of the concerns.
But ministers pressed for the law a third time because it was seen as an important counter-balance to anti-terror laws which can be seen to disproportionately target Britain's Muslim population.
In the Act that was actually passed, ministers believe there is a high enough "threshold" built into the law to protect free speech.
The new offence is limited to threatening words or behaviour, and the prosecution must prove "intention" to stir up religious hatred.
LONDON: Incitement to religious hatred will become a criminal offence in England and Wales with the commencement of a new Act from Monday that will extend the protection to Hindus, Muslims and Christians, hitherto enjoyed by only Sikhs and Jews.
The Racial and Religious Hatred Act creates a new offence of intentionally stirr-ing up religious hatred against people on religious grou-nds, closing a gap in the current legislation.
Existing offences in the Public Order 1986 Act legislate against inciting racial hatred. Sikhs and Jews have been deemed by the courts to be racial groups and are protected under this legislation, but other groups such as Hindus, Muslims and Christians are considered to be religious rather than racial groups, and have therefore not previously received any protection under the law.
The new Act will give protection to these groups by outlawing the use of threatening words or behaviour intended to incite hatred against groups of people defined by their religious beliefs or lack of belief.
Home office minister Vernon Coaker said: "This Act closes this small but important gap in the law against extremists who stir up hatred in our communities. To be attacked or targeted because of your race or religion is wholly unacceptable."
"It can have a devastating effect on victims who can find themselves on the receiving end of bigotry and hatred."
"We are committed to protecting everyone in our society and legislating against this abhorrent behaviour. Our overarching goal is to build a civilised society where we can all achieve our potential free from prejudice," Coaker said further.
NEW DELHI: Scores of Sikh activists staged a protest demonstration here today against the closure of the 1984 Sikh riot case against Congress leader Jagdish Tytler.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Saturday closed the case saying that most of the witnesses in the case are either dead or do not want to testify.
Angry protestors lashed out at the CBI decision.
"By closing the case they have betrayed the Sikh Community. They say they don't have evidence against him. I am ready to give evidence. I am ready to give copy of all the documents which were submitted to the Jain-Banerjee Committee, which was enquiring the riots," said Gurcharan Singh Babbar, President, All India Sikh Conference.
Tytler was appointed as Minister of State for Non-Resident Indians' (NRI) affairs after the Congress came to power in 2004, but he had to quit later.
Tytler has always denied the allegations levels against him saying, it was a political stunt by the opposition BJP.
Thousands of Sikhs were killed in one of the worst communal riots following the assassination of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards on October 31, 1984.
Congress leaders accused of leading the mobs have been absolved of the charges by lower courts.
People accusing Muslims of drugging, beating and raping Sikh women should be prosecuted for inciting religious hatred, an expert on religion has told Guardian Unlimited.
Philip Lewis, who is the Bishop of Bradford's aide on interfaith matters, was responding to claims posted by a group on the social networking site Facebook.
The group is called STOP OUR SIKH SISTERS BEING DRUGGED, RAPED, BEATEN AND USED FOR PROSTITUTION and claims that Sikh, Hindu and white girls from the ages of 13 to 22 are "being held against their will, drugged and gang raped" for the "pleasure" of Muslim extremists.
There is no evidence on the site to support the claims and Singh Kaur, the group's creator, provides no information about sources. But the group has attracted 2,900 members with nearly all of them young British Sikhs.
Dr Lewis said: "If there is a serious concern being raised then it's a matter for the police. If there is not a case to be answered, people need to be prosecuted.
"It is pernicious rumour-mongering that needs to be exposed. It's a form of slander. It is exacerbating relations between communities."
He said the issue was not on the radar of religious groups in Bradford, one of the "hotspots" cited by the group.
A Scotland Yard spokesman said there was no evidence that such activity was taking place in London, another allegedly "affected area".
One anti-racism activist urged people to either come forward with evidence or stop agitating.
Rob Deeks works for Aik Saath, a project that brings together Sikh, Muslim and Hindu youths from the Slough area, in Berkshire. It was set up after clashes between young people from different Asian communities.
He said: "Whoever is behind it is doing a good job of stirring up ill feeling. What's more worrying is there are 3,000 people who believe these claims."
The Facebook row is the latest salvo in an ongoing dispute between Hindu, Sikh and Muslim communities about forced or aggressive conversions.
Senior figures from Hindu and Sikh groups have accused Muslims of using underhand, sometimes violent, methods to convert girls to Islam. There has never been a formal investigation and there is no official complaint on record.
However one Sikh organisation said there was evidence of "heavy proselytising" on university campuses. Indarjit Singh, from the Network of Sikh Organisations, said: "The community is very concerned."
BANGKOK (dpa) - The alleged abduction of a wealthy Thai-Sikh businessman turned out to be a case of "runaway groom," Thai news reports said Tuesday.
The parents of Sutheep Sajjadev, a 38-year-old Sikh with a successful drapery business in Bangkok, informed police last Thursday that they suspected their son had been abducted.
Sutheep's abandoned Toyoto Lexus was found the next day with bloodstains, an unwound turban, pieces of a smashed mobile phone and a note saying: "You have caused trouble to our family, so we have taken your child."
Bangkok police, however, smelled something fishy about the alleged abduction when tests proved the bloodstains were from an animal, not a human.
The case was wrapped up Sunday night when a sheepish Sutheep returned home and later confessed to police that he had concocted the abduction ruse in an attempt to avoid an arranged marriage being forced upon him.
Police have been assigned to keep a close eye on Sutheep for fear he may harm himself. It was not immediately clear whether charges will be brought against the family for lodging a false complaint.
Amritsar • Angry family members and sympathisers of a four-year-old girl yesterday blocked traffic and demanded police action against the erring doctors for allegedly removing a kidney that led to her death the previous night.
Sonia Dubey, a resident of Gonda district of Uttar Pradesh had been undergoing treatment for a tumour in her belly at the government Medical College here. The family members have blamed the doctors that a kidney was removed from her without their knowledge. The girl died in pain at a private nursing home after her belly swelled rapidly.
Parents found out about her missing kidney only after she was admitted to the nursing home, where her condition deteriorated. Doctors at the hospital informed the parents that one of her kidneys had been removed.
Family members protested outside the office of district authorities, demanding that a murder case be registered against the principal of the government medical college, J P Kaur Shergill, and other doctors who had operated upon Sonia and removed her kidney recently.
Shergill and another doctor, who performed the operation, were suspended last week by medical education and research minister Tikshan Sud. A probe panel of senior doctors was set up to investigate the matter.
"My child was killed by these doctors. They should be punished for this," an inconsolable Shridhar Dubey, father of the girl said.
A grandmother and her son were jailed for life yesterday for ordering the murder of his wife, who they claimed had disgraced their traditional Sikh family by having an affair.
Surjit Athwal, 27, was lured to India where it is thought she was strangled and thrown into a river nine years ago. Her body has never been found.
Judge Giles Forrester sentenced Sukhdave Athwal, 43, and his mother Bachan Athwal, 70, to life imprison-ment for the “heinous crime” of plotting her murder.
Mrs Athwal, a grandmother of 16, wept in the dock as she was ordered to spend a minimum of 20 years in jail. Her son was told that he must serve at least 27 years behind bars. The pair were convicted of murder earlier this year after family members, who had initially been threatened against speaking out, came forward to police.
The court heard that Surjit, a mother of two, “disappeared off the face of the earth” after going to India with her mother-in-law to attend a family wedding in December 1998.
The Customs officer had been having an affair with a colleague at Heathrow, and had been planning to end her unhappy, ten-year arranged marriage.
When she failed to return to England, the killers, from Hayes, West London, told worried relatives and the police that she was a “slag” who had run away with another man. It is believed that she was strangled while in the Punjab and her body was thrown into the River Ravi.
Before sentence was passed yesterday, Kalyani Kaul, for Bachan, said that the grandmother, who suffered a small stroke during the trial, may die in jail.
Jonathan Rose, for Sukhdave, a Heathrow bus driver, said he was a good father to his children.
But Judge Forrester said: “You can hardly be a good father if you have killed their mother. This was a heinous crime characterised by great wickedness. The crime was premeditated and there was a significant degree of planning.”
In a victim impact statement read in court yesterday, Surjit’s brother Jagdeesh Singh described how the disappearance had left her family “stricken with anxiety”, made worse by the fact that her body was never found.
“The Athwals had managed to murder my sister and it appeared that with their manipulation and planning, they were going to get away with it. Surjit’s murderers were going about their lives as if nothing had happened,” he said.
Mr Singh said that in reaching justice, his family had battled with the “incompetence and disinterest” of the Indian police, Foreign Office apathy and a slow initial response from the Metropolitan police.
After the hearing at the Old Bailey, Surjit’s family and Asian women’s campaigners delivered a letter to Gordon Brown attacking the “double standards” of intervening when white Britons such as Madeleine McCann go missing, but failing to take action after Surjit’s disappearance.
It may be one of the most polluted cities in India, but investors are scenting a profit in Amritsar
Dean Nelson
From the road, the yellow wheat fields that spread from the border with Pakistan to the Sikh holy city of Amritsar look like a Bollywood film set waiting for the dancers. It’s classic Punjabi pastoral, with turbaned farmers tilling the fertile land. The mistake is to open the car window: the black sludgy river in the foreground is an open sewer that doubles as a rubbish tip and chemical-waste dump.
Given the stench, it is few people’s vision of a place in the sun. But Britain’s Indian community detects a whiff of opportunity in the air, and is pouring its money into the area’s booming property market.
Amritsar is at the heart of the extraordinary boom that has seen the Indian economy growing at almost 10% a year – up from 3% a decade ago. The city has grown rich on the rise of call centres, IT outsourcing and textiles, and the money is beginning to flow into its property market.
“The residential property market has grown rapidly over the past two years, by an average of 60%-70% in Mumbai, 70% in Delhi, 60%-75% in Bangalore, and 95%-100% in Chennai [Madras] and Hyderabad,” says Harvesp Mehta, the national director of investments for the Indian office of the estate agency Knight Frank, which expects prices across the country to continue to rise over the next two years, albeit at a more modest rate.
Analysts expect that such growth will soon be replicated in “second-tier” destinations such as Amritsar, where Knight Frank says prices have gone up by 40%-60% over the past two years. “Some of these small cities, such as Baroda, in Gujarat, will grow by 5m people over the next 10 years,” says one British-Indian merchant banker in the City of London. “That makes them a good bet for British-Indians to invest in.”
Most of his Indian friends, he says, are hunting for “the next Bangalore” - a small Indian town with “worthless rice paddies”, he says, that became “multimillion-pound residential plots” when the city became the heart of India’s IT revolution. His picks have been in Goa and Calcutta.
There is no doubt that India needs more homes - about 20m more by 2012, according to government figures. Need is only a part of it, though; also crucial, in terms of the market, is desire. As India’s 300m-strong middle class gets richer, there is an increasing desire to escape the appalling infrastructure, the stench of the sewers, the erratic power supply and the squalid streets.
In general, the ideal property is a flat in a modern, gated community, where residents can show off the latest computerised lighting systems and wireless hi-fi, and have guaranteed electricity and water, and access to smart shops, pools and health clubs.
Happily for investors, the demand for such homes is easily outstripping supply, which is why leading western investment banks such as JP Morgan, Citigroup and Credit Suisse have raised £500m to invest in new building projects in India.
It is also why smaller entrepreneurs are betting on cities such as Amritsar. Take Amar Sodhi, managing director of Avatar International, in London. Last week, the first 48 off-plan flats from the company’s Windsor Apartments, about a mile from Amritsar airport, went on sale, with prices starting at £39,000 for a two-bedroom, 113-square-metre flat. The properties would not look out of place in the London Docklands. Designed to suit the taste of British-based Indians, they boast “gourmet kitchens” and whirlpool baths. There is also a club with pool, spa and squash courts.
The apartments are in one of India’s worst pollution blackspots. Yet half of the first batch have been reserved by investors confident of doubling their money before the keys are handed over in 2009.
“There are 25m wealthy Sikhs around the world, and Amritsar is the home of the Golden Temple,” Sodhi says. “There are 600,000 Sikhs in Britain alone, and they like to travel to Amritsar, but good accommodation is limited.” He is particularly encouraged by the decision of the Radisson chain to build a five-star hotel next door.
Joginder Nijjar, and his wife, Nirmal, both solicitors from Walsall, agree with Sodhi’s analysis. Over the past 18 months, they have remortgaged their UK home and thrown in their life savings to invest more than £1m in residential and commercial projects in Amritsar and Delhi.
Nijjar says he had considered investing in India in the past, during visits to relatives, but was put off by fear of corruption. “You always think you’re going to get ripped off, but now there are good companies coming into the market,” he says. “I’m hoping for a rise of a couple of hundred per cent.”
Dilip Patel, 47, a knitwear manufacturer from Leicester, and his wife, Illa, signed up two years ago to buy a two-bedroom flat in the Ozone development, in Goregaon, Mumbai. They paid £60,000; similar properties are expected to go for double that when the complex is completed towards the end of next year. “Now I’m looking for another flat,” Dilip says.
British-Indians can buy under special provisions for those classed as people of Indian origin. By contrast, those without an ethnic link to the country can do so only if they have spent 182 days in the previous financial year living in India on a nontourist visa.
The rules have already been relaxed for commercial property, and there is speculation that the government could follow suit for flats and houses. In the meantime, you can get around the curbs by establishing a company in India and buying a property in its name to rent out as a holiday flat.
Free with every purchase is the unmistakable smell of the subcontinent - but Sodhi, for one, does not expect it will put off the buy-to-let investors he’s targeting. “Some of these places do stink,” he admits. “As a child, I used to get asthma in nearby Ludhiana, but today it has more Mercedes cars than anywhere in India, and some of its houses sell for £1m. The smell won’t harm the investment.”
Tom Lantos, chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee warned the Transportation Security Administration about religious profiling after it changed its screening procedures to include searches of turbans reports Rediff.com. The 14-term California Democrat said the new policy to pull aside airline passengers with headgear had led to harassment of Sikh passengers. Sikh Americans have been asked to remove their turbans, a fundamental symbol of their faith, at the airport. Since the new policy was instituted August 4, more than 50 such incidents have been reported across the country. "The lack of religious sensitivity and inconsistency in implementing this revised policy is astounding and disturbing,' Lantos complained in a letter to TSA Adminstrator Kip Hawley adding that he could not understand how 'an agency that took pride in working with religious and community groups after the tragic events of September 11, 2001 be so cavalier and discriminatory in its policy that affects those same groups just six years later.' He asked for the TSA to quickly enact changes. Three Sikh organizations, SALDEF, the Sikh Coalition, and UNITED SIKHS submitted a joint memorandum to TSA expressing their concern that the new procedures give screeners to much latitude.
Eastnor Castle, near Ledbury, is joining a nationwide cultural project this Sunday (September 23).
The castle is holding activities from 11am to 4.30pm as part of the Anglo Sikh Trail, which highlights connections between the Sikhs and Britain.
Musicians and dancers will perform Bhangra at 1pm before a lecture surrounding the castle's collection of Sikh war armour and weaponry starts at 2pm.
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Harbinder Singh from the heritage trail said: "Eastnor Castle's participation in Anglo Sikh Heritage Week will bring to life the remarkable history which represents its connection with Britain and the Sikhs."
For more information visit www.eastnorcastle.com or call 01531 633160.
A group of local Sikhs have been allowed to carry out a cremation in the Afghan capital, Kabul.
The authorities intervened after Muslims in the Old City stopped Sikhs burning a body at their traditional cremation site in the Qalacha area.
Sikh mourners carried the body to the presidential palace and UN headquarters until the chief of police escorted them back and the cremation went ahead.
Muslims near the site had complained about the smell from funeral pyres.
The long and fascinating history of the connections between Sikh and English cultures is to be celebrated during the forthcoming Anglo-Sikh Heritage Week.
Running from September 15-23 2007, this year will see an extended programme of events spread right across the country.
From an introduction to Sikh arms and armour at London’s Wallace Collection to Rangoli art workshops at Soho House in Birmingham, the events aim to show the shared history of British and Sikh people.
Other highlights include stories of the magnificent Koh-in-Noor diamonds in the Tower of London, a showcase of the Royal Geographical Society’s unique collection of original maps and photos from the Punjab and an exploration of the complicated relationship between deposed rebel prince Maharajah Duleep Singh and the Empress of India Queen Victoria at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight.
Anglo Sikh Heritage Trail (ASHT) Project Manager Hema Raull said: “Exciting, informative, stirring and fun are some of the words used to describe the range of activities that took place last year during ASHT week.”
“This year is no exception. During ASHT week you can learn about Sikh history, culture and tradition through a variety of activities and by learning more about a range of fascinating characters.”
The week has been organised by the Anglo Sikh Heritage Trail, a project of the Maharajah Duleep Singh Centenary Trust, which exists to promote Sikh heritage in Britain. The Trail covers a range of sites and institutions throughout the UK was launched in July 2004.
Visit the Anglo Sikh Heritage Trail websiteto download a programme of events, learn about the trail and for more information about Sikh history and culture.
Washington Post Staff Writers Sunday, September 9, 2007; Page A08
Like all practicing Sikhs, Gurpreet Singh Tuteja wears his turban as a sacred symbol of his faith and its values of discipline and austerity. Every morning, the Arlington County business consultant winds a long bolt of black or saffron cloth tightly around his uncut hair, where it remains until he returns home. He has worn the turban on hundreds of business trips, without incident.
But several weeks ago, when he was boarding a flight in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to return to Washington, Tuteja, 24, said he felt shocked and humiliated when a Transportation Safety Administration screener pulled him aside to "pat down" his turban as part of a new policy, even though he had passed through the metal detector without incident
"For us, the turban is a sign of respect for God. It is not like a cowboy hat. It was very uncomfortable having someone touch it," Tuteja said Friday. "I am all for the security of the United States. I am an American, too. But it should not come to the point where civil liberties are denied. I want the airways to be safe, but I also want my rights."
The new TSA policy, enacted Aug. 4 along with other rule changes, gives airport screeners additional discretion to search passengers' headgear, including turbans, which could conceal plastic or other nonmetal parts of explosive devices. Agency officials said the policy is not meant to single out any groups.
"We were looking at where people can hide" bomb components, TSA Administrator Kip Hawley said of the policy in a recent interview. "Whether it's a cowboy hat or a turban, this is what it is. And it was not directed at any one type of person or religion. It was directed at keeping bomb parts off of airplanes."
The measure set off an uproar in the country's well-organized Sikh community, whose members are sensitive to religious slights and are on guard against being unfairly suspected as terrorists. To many, the new rules seem to cross a line from inconvenience to insult, from prudence to prejudice.
About a half-million Sikhs live in the United States, with 10,000 in the Washington region. Many are technology and science professionals, and most are first- or second-generation immigrants from India, where Sikhism was founded several centuries ago as an offshoot of Hinduism.
"Our religion is one of peace and harmony, and our turbans stand for everything that is against terrorism," said Amardeep Singh, executive director of the Sikh Coalition in New York. "By saying that our turbans should be subject to additional screening, the federal government has equated our most precious article of faith with a terrorist implement."
Sikh groups, who say that about 50 Sikhs have had their turbans inspected since Aug. 4, said that the policy change goes against an agreement they made with TSA officials after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Under that agreement, Sikhs were allowed to wear turbans through airport detectors when other passengers had to remove their hats. If the machine did not beep, the traveler could continue. If it beeped, the turban would be screened with a wand, patted down, or removed and examined in a private screening area.
Under the new rules, even if there is no alarm, a TSA screener can ask to examine a turban.
"The procedure we came up with in 2001 was working fine. It was respectful of religious practice while also allowing airports to do screening," said Ranjit Singh, an official with the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund in Washington. The new procedure, he said, is misguided and subject to abuse. "A Sikh's turban becomes like part of his body. To have it removed is like being strip-searched."
As a result of the outcry, TSA officials have spoken with Sikh groups and plan to meet with them this week. Officials said they would normally have alerted Sikh groups to the changes but were focused on other adjustments, such as loosened restrictions on carrying lighters and breast milk.
"It wasn't intentional," Chris White, a TSA spokesman, said last week. "It was just an oversight."
The turban controversy is not the first clash between public safety and Sikh culture, which also requires male devotees to carry a small ceremonial dagger, called a kirpan, as a symbol of martial traditions. After dozens of post-9/11 confrontations over carrying kirpans in airports or courthouses, Sikhs have become accustomed to putting kirpans in checked luggage.
Muslim headscarves, crucifixes and Sikh bangles should be banned at schools unless they can be incorporated into the dress code, most parents polled in a survey by Reader’s Digest said.
Eighty-three per cent feel such religious symbols are unacceptable, while more than half (52 per cent) of parents also disapprove of faith schools, according to the poll by Reader’s Digest. The YouGov survey, of 565 parents with children at state school, shows disillusionment with the comprehensive school system. Parents want more homework to be set, are in favour of increased testing and would like to be more involved in their child’s schooling. If they could afford to, 59 per cent would send their children to private school.
At least 20 people were injured Monday, including 11 seriously injured, in a clash in Indian state of Punjab between a group of Sikhs and followers of a cult leader, who had triggered an angry row with the Sikhs some four months ago by dressing up like one of their faith's revered founders.
The incident erupted in Punjab's Mansa district when Sikhs objected to a prayer event organized by followers of Gurmeet Ram Raheem Singh, who heads the cult called Dera Sacha Sauda.
Singh's followers and Sikhs pelted each other with stones and used bamboo sticks, the Press Trust of India (PTI) quoted police as saying from Punjab, the Sikh-majority state.
In May, newspaper advertisements showing the Dera head dressing up like Guru Gobind Singh, the revered Sikh figure, sparked fierce clashes between Sikhs and the cult followers in Punjab.
The Golden Temple, in Amritsar [Images], Punjab, glowed like a jewel on September 1, the 403rd anniversary of the installation of the revered Guru Granth Sahib in this Sikh shrine.
The Guru Granth Sahib, the holy book of the Sikhs, was declared equal to a living guru by Guru Gobind Singh, the last guru of the Sikhs in 1708.
Guru Gobind Singh said that on his death the Guru Granth would become the next Guru. This book of 5,000 hymns and 1,430 pages is the receptacle of all Sikhs teachings as well as words of wisdom of other saints like Kabir and Tulsi Das.
From the 16th century onwards these hymns or couplets of religious discourse from all the Sikh gurus were gradually collected and assembled. It was finally complete in 1604 and installed in the Golden Temple
To mark this special day a procession, that ended at the Harmandir Sahib, was organised by the priests of the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee. Wearing colourful robes devotees chanted hymns as they proceeded to the temple.
Photograph: A Sikh boy lights an oil lamp in front of the Golden TempleImage: Narinder Nanu/AFP/ Getty Images
Sikhs with turbans, Muslims who cover hair protest against policy they say discriminates
Sep 03, 2007 04:30 AM
Neil MacFarquhar NEW YORK TIMES
WASHINGTON–A new U.S. government policy that subjects travellers who wear any type of head covering to possible additional screening at airport checkpoints has prompted vociferous protests from Sikh organizations, who say they are being singled out for ethnic profiling.
Muslim women who veil their hair are also expressing concern that the change – particularly because further screening is at the discretion of each screener – will single out Muslims.
"The federal government has equated our most precious article of faith with terrorism," said Amardeep Singh, the executive director of the Sikh Coalition, an advocacy group for Sikhs, whose faith dictates that men wear turbans, though some women do as well.
"To send a message that the turban is dangerous sends the wrong message to society."
The U.S. Transportation Security Administration, which adopted and is enforcing the policy, said that it was aimed not just at turbans but at any headgear and that it was one of the periodic adjustments made to address changing threats. It addresses nonmetallic threats including some explosives.
The change allows for screeners to pat down anyone who is wearing a hat or other head covering, even if the person clears a metal detector.
"It is a matter of when the security officer cannot reasonably determine that the head area is free of a threat item," said Amy Kudwa, a spokesperson for the agency.
The change was part of several adjustments made on Aug. 4, including allowing passengers to carry cigarette lighters and small quantities of bottled breast milk.
But the change regarding headgear was not publicized and came to light only after many Sikh passengers underwent additional screenings.
The Canadian Air Transport Security Authority, which co-ordinates security policy across the country, has no plans to introduce similar guidelines.
"At this point the directive remains we search headgear only for cause," spokesperson Brigitte Caron told the Toronto Star's Robyn Doolittle. "It could be a cowboy hat. (All) headgear is treated the same."
Back in the United States, a Sikh businessman, Prabhjit Singh, said he was made to leave the screening line when he balked at the secondary search before an early flight on Aug. 17 from Baltimore/Washington International Airport.
Singh was not told of the new policy until after his turban was inspected by hand in a private room.
"The supervisor made me feel like I had done something wrong," said Singh, 27, a motivational speaker from Maryland. "I felt for the first time in America that I had been targeted, and it was because of the way I looked."
The fact that the policy was put into effect without consulting Sikhs also rankled the Sikh Coalition, which puts the number of Sikhs in the United States at 280,000, part of about 21 million in the world.
Kudwa said the Transportation Security Administration was now discussing the policy with Sikh leaders.
The Golden Temple, in Amritsar [
