Gurpreet Singh writes from Vancouver

LAST month the Khalsa School building in Vancouver was destroyed in a suspicious fire. While the fire destroyed most part of the building, the holy scriptures of the Sikhs, the Guru Granth Sahib escaped the blaze. It has been shifted from there since and a section of media has encouraged people to visit the temple where it is currently placed for viewing.

Not only the Punjabi media that is largely owned by the Sikhs, but the English media has also sensationalized the story. Whereas the media is portraying it as a miracle, the Sikh preachers have honoured the fire fighters, who saved the scriptures at the insistence of the religious onlookers.

There is nothing wrong with expressing gratitude to the fire fighters who respected the sentiments of the Sikh community and made every effort to save the Guru Granth Sahib, but the way this story is being overplayed by the media is irrational. Since the authorities are calling the fire incident suspicious the media should try to figure out who could be responsible for burning a school, the temple of education rather than promoting superstition.

The media should also have included the voice of the rationalists in the story who could have offered scientific explanation to the so called wonder.

As devout Sikhs treat the Guru Granth Sahib as their living master, some people in the community believe that it saved itself from the fire. Well. How can then the Guru Granth Sahib be so disinterested in the school getting burnt and destroyed before him? After all, the Guru Granth Sahib teaches compassion.

Indeed, the tenth and the last master of the Sikhs, Guru Gobind Singh had asked the Sikhs to follow the Guru Granth Sahib as their guiding light after him. It is for this reason that the religious fundamentalists oppose parallel Sikh sects led by living Gurus. There have been violent sectarian fights in Punjab , India and elsewhere involving the Sikh hardliners and the followers of different sects in the recent past. In some instances, the fights were sparked by the desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib by the supporters of these controversial sects. Why couldn’t the Guru Granth Sahib escape from those attacks? There have been a number of fire incidents that gutted the Sikh temples and the holy Guru Granth Sahib at different times. Why such miracles did not happen then?

These are some hard questions the people should ask themselves instead of getting swayed by such illogical propaganda. After all, the Sikhism educates its followers against the blind faith. The founder of the Sikhism, Guru Nanak had challenged both the Hindu and the Muslim preachers who practiced unscientific rituals. Unfortunately, the Sikh fundamentalists have turned their religion into dogma. Their approach towards the whole episode is no different to the orthodox Hindus who had lined up outside the temples in India several years ago following rumours of the idols of deity drinking milk.

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Halifax Gurdwara mourns the death of Dr. Hew McLeod

Jagpal Singh Tiwana

HALIFAX Gurdwara, Canada, on Sunday August 2 , 2009,  paid tributes to Dr. Hew McLeod, the celebrated scholar of Sikh studies, who breathed his last on July 20, 2009. Jagpal Singh Tiwana, President of the Gurdwara, recalled the visit of Dr. Hew McLeod to Halifax in October 1992 at the invitation of the Maritime Sikh Society, Halifax. Dr. McLeod was accompanied by his charming wife, Margaret. He presented a paper, 'The Sikh Struggle in the Eighteenth Century and its Relevance Today' at the International Centre Saint Mary's University, Halifax, spoke in the Gurdwara on 'Punjabis in New Zealand' and attended a reception in his honor in the evening at a local restaurant.

Mr. Gursharan Singh Toor, ex-president of our Gurdwara, was the chief speaker for the occasion. He paid glowing tributes to Dr. McLeod while appreciating his solid contribution to Sikh Studies. He said originally McLeod came to Punjab as Christian missionary, but was "spellbound by these new and different looking people called Sikhs. As he began to know them more, his fascination for their culture, history and their life style intensified. Ultimately, he not only quit the missionary service but also left Christianity and became a self proclaimed atheist..."

Mr. Toor remarked that McLoed was not only a scholar of high caliber, he had the qualities of character which impressed every one who came in contact with him, "I found Hew McLeod a very calm, stable, consistent but persistent person. His serenity could not be disturbed by any loud mouth. To me, he displayed the aura of what in Gurbani (Sikh scriptures) is called "Sehaj Avastha" or total serenity." remarked Mr. Toor

Mr.Toor specifically pointed out Dr. McLeod's contribution on the turban issue in Canada. In 1994 McLeod appeared as an expert witness in a court in Calgary and stressed the importance of turban to a Sikh when Baltej Singh Dhillon's right to wear a turban in the Canadian Police was challenged. Mr. Dhillon won the case and Sikhs are indebted to Dr. McLeod for the historic decision of the court. World Sikh Organization (WSO) thanked Dr. McLeod in its newsletter.

Mr Toor also had few words of praise for his wife Margaret who was not only his customary wife but a rock solid loyal friend through every thick and thin ready to face the consequences of their decisions. With such loyal and supportive company, he followed his new passion in life: "Understanding of Sikhs, Sikhism and various aspects of their history."

Mr. Toor concluded his tribute with an advice to members of Gurdwara Sangat, "This is the man whom I salute today. The best homage I can pay to this serene person is that we follow his methods of research and dedication relating to all fields of Sikh studies." Full address of Mr. Toor can be read at http://home.istar.ca/~cye/toor%20on%20McLeod.html

At the conclusion of Gurdwara ceremonies Mrs. Satpal Kaur Sodhi, auothor of a book , "Sikh Ardas", Chattar Singh Jiwan Singh, Amritsar, 2005, led the Ardas and prayed to Akal Purkh for granting peace to the departed soul.

[Jagpal Singh Tiwana, The Maritime Sikh Society, 10 Parkhill Road, Halifax, NS, Canada, B3P 1R3]

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Comrade Boojha Singh’s murder by the Punjab police:  a scar on the history

Gurpreet Singh writes from Vancouver

THE story of Comrade Boojha Singh will always remind us how ruthlessly the Indian state treated its freedom fighter, who deserved a dignified death after his country’s independence. A former member of the Gadhar Party, a revolutionary group that resisted the British occupation of India, Boojha Singh was not killed by the foreign rulers, but by the police force of the country for whose freedom he had fought.

This week was his death anniversary. Had he died at the hands of the British government, the Indian government would have observed his martyrdom day. But his death anniversary passed without any state recognition for obvious reasons.  

He was abducted by the Punjab Police and liquidated in a staged encounter on July 27, 1970 for being an active participant in the ultra leftist Naxalite movement. The movement was launched by those who believed in armed struggle against the unfair distribution of wealth and exploitation of the landless farm workers.

According to Tarkunde Committee inquiry, Boojha Singh, who was above 80 at the time of his death, was tortured. The police in all probabilities had cooked up the story of a gun battle. Significantly, this had happened during the tenure of Parksah Singh Badal, the current Chief Minister of Punjab, who led the state back then too. Badal was grilled in the assembly by the communist legislators following his death. He had to face angry protests on his foreign tours as well. He however remained unfazed and did not initiate any government enquiry to punish the guilty police officials. The naxalites later killed a person believed to be a collaborator in Boojha Singh’s alleged murder.

Boojha Singh’s life as a revolutionary began in Argentina. A native of village Chuk Mai Dass in Jalandhar, he gad gone there to earn his living, but he was eventually wedded to a cause that became more important to him than his family life. He came under the influence of another freedom fighter, Bhagat Singh Bilga, who was also related to him. Bilga has died in May this year. As a member of the Gadhar Party that was launched in 1913 by the Indian expatriates in USA, he had led the first batch of revolutionaries to Moscow. Boojha Singh who was a religious person back home gradually became a Marxist after the communist indoctrination in Russia. He was associated with the Kirti Party that was merged into the Communist Party of India. He later joined the Marxist Communist Party of India. Disillusioned with the political approach of the mainstream communist party he joined the radical left movement. But he consistently remained a leftist till the time of his death. Boojha Singh had also played an important role in the building a memorial of the freedom fighters in Jalandhar. While the Indian politicians often gather at the memorial to give a tokenistic tribute to the martyrs, Boojha Singh’s voice was silenced by the Indian establishment that instead of examining the psyche of the revolutionaries like him killed him mercilessly. The legacy of Boojha Singh, who had endured the life of an activist not only under the British rule but also in the free India after 1947, will remain a guiding light for those who believe in social justice and continuous struggle for a humane society.

“The prophecy made by Comrade Bujha Singh with regard to the disintegration of USSR during the meeting of the Communist Party of Britain, proved quite true,” this was stated by Gandharva Sain, a veteran freedom fighter and former general secretary of the Desh Bhagat Yadhgar Committee, Jalandhar, while addressing a seminar on the Punjabi book “Baba Bujha Singh” authored by Ajmer Sidhu, here at the Punjab Mata Vidhyawati Bhawan, on Sunday. The seminar was jointly organised by literary organisations -‘Lok Kavi Sant Ram Udasi Yadgari Trust’ and Doaba Sahitaya Sabha.

“Comrade Bujha Singh had termed the line of action adopted during the 20th congress of the Communist International held in 1956, as ‘anti communist’ and ‘anti labour class’, said Gandharv Sain adding that Bujha had regretfully predicted that the USSR, which had been known as a model of communism in the world would perish due to the wrong line of action adopted by the Communist International.

Prof. Jagmohan Singh, nephew of Shaheed Bhagat Singh lauded the effort of Ajmer Sidhu. Comrade SS Azad, Ajit Singh Rahi (Australia), Sukhwinder Singh Kandola, Surinder Kumari, Kulwinder Singh Warraich, Paramjit Dehal, among others, also spoke on the occasion.

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