I missed the fact that this piece was actually published. I notice how it is a fluid piece because the realities of protest were unraveling very quickly in those days. Yet, I notice, this is the only piece which will have the names of the two who died or suffered grievously the violent aspects of the protests against the sacrilege of the Sikh holy book.
Archive for the ‘Punjab’ Category
Friends, In Daljit Ami’s and my opinion, the response of the Punjab Government towards the organizers of the November 10 Sarbat Khalsa is wrong and should be condemned.
‘If raising a voice against nepotism, corruption and political interference in religious matters is treason then it is a proud treason. Every conscientious, curious person who is a believer in justice must raise his/her voice against such repression. Count us (the writer and translator) among them.’
Friends, if you heard about the Sarbat Khalsa near Amritsar November 10 you may want to read my report on the proeedings and critical remarks. If you have not heard of it because regular media managed to blank it out, you must now get acquainted with how Punjab is inching towards risky times. It needs your attention. Also read for the resolutions passed at the plenary meet. In spite of one and a half days now, I have not found them anywhere on the web in English.
‘I do not know what to derive from the resolutions as they put me squarely back into the dilemma: am I first a Sikh, and then an Indian, or vice versa, or only one of the two?’
Friends, the Sarbat Khalsa has been convened near Amritsar on November 10. It is being variously sanctioned by Sikh organisations and opposed by others, including political forces which have a say in matters of the community including the SGPC, Akal Takht, and so on.
In this scenario Daljit Ami writes about a core issue that impacts the community’s response. Translated by me.
Here is Daljit Ami’s recent column on the Sikh protest in Punjab and how it is shaped, where it is headed. Translated by me.
We need more and more voices to articulate the two independent protests in Punjab: farmer-worker Unions and the intra-community Sikh struggle against the hegemony of the SGPC. Both are against the same Akali government.
It means a lot in this country that the non-violent character of a protest stays intact as the Punjab farmer-worker ‘rail roko’ enters Day 7 when talks with the government failed last evening. Overall the protest is more than a month long. This is a ground up movement and all political parties stand discredited. How far will the government push the protestors?
My ground report from Day 4 detailing the issues.
Here is the translation of Daljit Ami’s column on the Dera Sachha Sauda Head being given general pardon by the high priests of the Sikh faith. It talks about the current reality of Punjab and traces how vote-bank politics has dictated the decision.
Friends, here is my piece on the partition of India and Pakistan in which I look at what happened to the Sikh psyche since then and suggest a radical retelling of our stories because though the trauma still haunts us …
‘… All we have for one generation are wisps of memory and for the next, family stories buried in silences. It is the third generation now which is trying to engage with Partition. Our generation has heard these stories in whispers and created many online projects where we are turning family histories into oral histories. Yet, pick up any newspaper, recollect the history of riots and genocides in independent India, and we will realise that we are still caught up in the same mess of communalism that created Partition.’
The piece appears in the recent issue of Muse India excellently curated by Charanjeet Kaur. Thank you! Thank you Asiimwe Deborah GKashugi, Ajay Bhardwaj, Prof Alok Bhalla for allowing me to use your quotes. Please read …
Friends, here is my translation of Daljit Ami’s column on how the politics of Punjab is now informed and even controlled by voices outside Punjab. How these moves reduce the issue to sloganeering and not much else.
Please read …
Friends, my comment piece on the ban on the film ‘Nanak Shah Fakir’ in today’s Hindustan Times.
The issue with the movie is that: ‘In Sikhism, we do not give a physical representation to the Gurus.’ Yet, for more than a hundred years Sikhs have been turning towards image and idol worship – ‘but prasti’. I do not understand these calls for bans every few months. The bans are becoming a joke while the need is for reconciliation over the events and ideologies of the past decades and reform in the religion.
‘If the Sikh clergy now resists ‘Nanak Shah Fakir’, because it depicts the Guru in a human form, it would do well to consider how blasphemous the Sikh community has been with the images and icons of the Gurus.’
Please read …