Pyara

The family's party can easily be rescheduled to other local halls that are not related to our Guru Ghars. Not that I support the promotion of meat, sharab and parties, but if they are struggling for alternatives then there's a list I just found for them on a simple google search. At leat they don't have the paap of doing the Guru Ghar's beadbi if they move their party somewhere else Have the GNSS Dudley Committee kept the family in the loop in all this palaver or are the family in the dark? Perhaps Mr Medare or Mr Sangha can advise. Brierley Hill Civic Hall Bank Street, Brierley Hill, West Midlands, DY5 3DA 01384 812730 Dudley Wood Primary School Dudley Wood Road, Dudley, West Midlands, DY2 0DB 01384 818690 Dudley Leisure Centre Wellington Road, Dudley, West Midlands, DY1 Kingswinford Community Centre 425, High St, Kingswinford, West Midlands DY6 8AP 01384 273625 Gornal and Sedgley Labour Club 88 Clarence Street Dudley, West Midlands, DY3 1UP Sedgley Community Centre Ladywalk Sedgley Amblecote Scouts Hut School Drive Amblecote Stourbridge

SukhdevSinghMedare, This is not a tug of war of egos or about some political compromise as you seem to attempt to portray this. And to think we are promoting a division of the the Panth based on "liberalism" is naive in my opinion. The Panths foundation is based on Gurmat ideals but in my opinion Dudley Committee are building their foundations with weak materials of Manmat rather than Gurmat. The desire to serve alcohol, meat and promote a belligerent atmosphere in the property of Guru Nanak is an opinion based on Manmat purely on their own ego, pride and only based on their own personal needs and desires. I'm sorry if that accusations hurts you or your family members. You talk about liberation, but today we have all forgotten that Gurmat is about liberation - liberation from the cycles of birth and death in which we chase our tail, liberation from the five urges that we worship rather than Waheguru, liberation from mythologies, liberation from addictions of alcohol and drugs, liberation from social pressures, liberation from male exploitation of women, religious persecution, racial injustice, caste segregation and oppression of spiritual human rights. The entire Sikh path is a process of spiritual transformation of human soul from 'Manmukh' to 'Gurmukh'. The teachings of the Great Gurus are for the human beings irrespective of their caste and creed. Our great Gurus blessed us with a way of life. The Gurus imbibed a new spirit in our lives and consoled us and explained to us the spiritual realities and brought us out from worldly illusions. The Gurus prayed to Waheguru to bless the Sikh for their welfare and goodness, so that the people may not suffer from worldly temptations. The Gurus even paved a way towards the salvation of Sikhs as human beings. We could be teaching our community these amazing things but no, Dudley Gurdwara Committee want to promote getting drunk in their COMMUNITY CENTRE whilst dancing to a song about a young womans waistline! Dudley Committee can self-justify their own desires to remain in the realms of Manmat as "modernity" or "social progression" but the reality is they are not only destroying their own jeevans but destroying the jeevans of generations who will be born in their own households. The committee have a blessing and a moral obligation as caretakers of a Guru Ghar, they have a stronger chance to be free of all the Manmat of the world but instead they waste this jewel of an opportunity. The tuks that come to my mind is in Sri Anand Sahib when Guru Amar Das Maharaj tells us about the KUTAMB (the drama of life) and says aisaa kamm moolay na keechai jit ant pachhotaa-ee-ai. Don't do anything that you will regret in the end. satguroo kaa updays sun too hovai tayrai naalay. Listen to the Teachings of the True Guru - these shall go along with you.

Parnaam Shaheed Nu! 2011 and still we have people abusing Gurdwara properties allowing meat, sharab and dancing in what is now called "acceptable" party halls or community centres.

SukhdevSinghMedare Ji You clearly know this is not a playground scrap, this is about Gurmat. Your tactics of repeating your same post again and again is just a sign of despracy to back a weak moral agenda. Sikh principles, morals and rehat maryada are being mocked by this Committee. This could be India or UK, they could be Hindu, Muslim, Christian and Sikh but the abuse of the Guru ghar properties is a maha beadbi, the kind of maha beadbi Baba Deep Singh, Baba Gurbaksh Singh, Nankana Sahib shaheeds gave their lives for. Fact is that it's just gone on for too long there's a 5 month history of attempted dialogue with the Committee you defend. You talk about respect for elders but fail to mention the lack of respect the Committee gave to those elders who came from all the various Midlands Gurdwaras to meet Atwal, Sandhu, Purewal, Rai, Medare (your relative) and others. You fail to talk about the insult your Committee has directed to Akal Takht Maryada which our mahan shaheeds gave their lives to uphold. It's nothing personal but the trap GNSS Dudley Committee and members like you have fallen into is that you appear to believe running the house of Dhan Dhan Guru Nanak Dev Maharaj is about "maximising" the donations. Guru Ji already clearly tells us that influenced by the money, we become greedy, in turn, greed gives rise to corruption and selfishness. In that state not only do we ruin ourselves but we drag our community down with us too. Accordingly, Guru Ji indicates that the ones with greed cannot be trusted. Such people are compared to the mad dog with rabies. "Their madness ruins everything", states the Gurbani. ਲੋਭ ਲਹਰਿ ਸਭੁ ਸੁਆਨੁ ਹਲਕੁ ਹੈ ਹਲਕਿਓ ਸਭਹਿ ਬਿਗਾਰੇ ॥: Lobh lahari sabh suaan halak hai halkio sabhai bigaare: The waves of greed are like mad dogs with rabies. Their madness ruins all (those whom they bite – ਵੱਢ ਵੱਢ ਕੇ) All GurSikhs want to do is to advise your Committee to not drag their jeevans down and not drag the jeevans down of the Community they believe they "support". I understand your loyalty, but perhaps you don't understand the Sidik of the Sikh. Sir Jave ta Jave Mera Sikhi Sidik naa jave My head can go but my Sikhi wont go. You can mock and ridicule people like us all you want, but we will be attending this rally in huge numbers to express our hurt at the continuous abuse the Committee show towards Sikh Maryada and the properties of the Guru Ghar. You can craft cunning loopholes seperating the hall but ultimately the truth is the truth, eventually it's going to force it's way out. I pray you do join us all on Saturday when we unite together and recite Sri Chaupai Sahibs for our Panth's Chardi Kala.

I saw a scroll on Sikh TV yesterday about the protest.

Sikh Cultural Centre opposite & part of: Gurdwara Guru Nanak Singh Sabha 118 Wellington Road Dudley Wellington DY1 1UB

Unfortunately, yes! If only we were more vocal in condemning alcohol and all these "Sikh" promoters of alcohol who we let run our Gurdwara Committees and represent the Sikh Community, perhaps we wouldn't be in this embarrassing situation. As this Committee of "maha papis" are not willing to accept what Gurmat tells them or Akal Takht Maryada then perhaps some scientific facts about alcohol might make them see what their responsiblity to their community should be. Ethyl alcohol is the common psychoactive drug found in all alcoholic beverages. For example, one drink – a pint of lager, a 1.5 ounce of distilled spirit, or a glass of wine – contains about 0.5-0.6 ounce of psychoactive drug "ethyl alcohol". When a person ingests alcohol, approximately 20% gets immediately absorbed from the stomach into the bloodstream, approximately 75% is absorbed through the upper part of the small intestine, and any remaining alcohol enters the bloodstream further along the gastrointestinal. Like any other psychoactive drug, ethyl alcohol is addictive. More one drinks, more his body wants it. Alcohol abuse and addiction (dependency) has many short term and long term effects on the user. It is a central nervous system depressant that slows down overall activity of the central nervous system. Death from alcohol poisoning can be caused either by central nervous system and respiratory depression or by inhaling fluid or vomit into the lungs. Other effects include, kidney failure, breast cancer, brain damage, liver disease, osteoporosis, damage to the digestive system (increased risk of cancers of the lip, mouth, larynx, esophagus, liver, rectum, stomach, and pancreas), impairment o the senses (less acute vision, smell, taste, and hearing, etc.), loss of life expectancy by about 15 years, damage to fetus, mental disorders, and so on. Alcohol use causes more serious social and psychological problems than all other forms of drug abuse combined. Alcohol reacts with other drugs, potentially leading to coma and death. The combination of impaired judgment, weakened sensory perception, reduced inhibitions, impaired motor coordination, increased anger and hostility (aggressiveness), etc., that characterises alcohol intoxication can be dengrous or even deadly (e.g., violence, road crashes, murder, suicide, and so on)... ....And this Committee want to promote the consumption of alcohol under the banner of our pavitar Nishaan Sahib!

The Sangat in Derby, Gravesend and West Bromwich have been fortunate enough to have several open dialogues with the Jathedar of Sri Akal Takht Sahib Giani Gurbachan Singh and the Singh Sahiban over the last few days regarding the insult and ridicule of Sikh Maryada that the committee of GNSS Dudley are carrying out. The Jathedar has backed the need for immediate action to be taken at a local level against this committee. Please can you all now speak to your Gurdwara Committees and all Jathebhandi's to formally write to GNSS Dudley to communicate the concerns of the Sikh community: Mr Ajit Singh Sandhu and Committee Gurdwara Guru Nanak Singh Sabha 118 Wellington Road Dudley Wellington DY1 1UB The National Anti-Beadbi rally in Dudley scheduled for 28 May has also been tweeted by the following non-Sikh media groups: http://news.protestwatch.org.uk/national-beadbi-rally-at-dudley-uk http://www.religious...r/guest-writer/

Just found out last night's show was recorded and will be aired later this week. SC have never gone off air completely in it's 2 year history, even when the channel was low on dd. Must admit, did seem strange the channel went down whilst Kam was discussing some personal accusations towards him as an indivdiual and criticism made about the past show content. Maybe the LIVE format for the Youth Show is proving difficult for SC to handle, I suspect they get a fair few moans from people about the "conterversial" content. I suppose we'll see an edited version of last nights show when it's eventually aired.

Some of us may be fortunate enough to have darshan of the Singh Sahiban in the next few days. Humble benti to those who are in a postion to speak to the Singh Sahiban, perhaps you can discuss the following with them: 1 - Please reiterate the 2006 Sandesh, where Akal Takht Sahib clearly say no meat, alcohol, dancing and parties in any gurdwara property. Many of the UK committees who allow this manmat still make their own interpretations that meat and alcohol can be served in gurdwara owned comunity halls. 2 - Guru Nanak Singh Sabha Gurdwara Dudley refusing to stop meat and alcohol in gurdwara community hall even after beanti from sikh leaders and sangat. They openly critised Sikh Maryada, what would you say about their behaviour? 3 - 25 years of Sarbat Khalsa, what are your views on the decisions made that day and how can we work towards acheiving those aspirations? 4 - What seva does the Akal Takhat do for 1984 shaheed families and how can the uk sikhs support? 5 - How can UK Sikhs help to get justice for 1984 and more recent victims of government brutality? Anymore ideas???

Thanks for sharing the info. Humble benti to those who are in a postion to speak to the Singh Sahiban, please can you at least cover the following: 1 - Please reiterate the 2006 Sandesh, which is no meat, alcohol, dancing and parties in any gurdwara property. Many of these committees still make their own interpretations that meat and alcohol can be served in gurdwara owned comunity halls. 2 - Guru Nanak Singh Sabha Gurdwara Dudley refusing to stop meat and alcohol in gurdwara community hall even after beanti from sikh leaders and sangat. They openly critised Akal Takht maryada, what would you say about their behaviour? 3 - 25 years of Sarbat Khalsa, what are your views on the decisions made that day and how can we work towards acheiving those aspirations? 4 - What seva does the Akal Takhat do for 1984 shaheed families and how can the uk sikhs support? 5 - How can UK Sikhs help to get justice for 1984 and more recent victims of government brutality?

Maybe this is where bringing parallels from our history can help by empowering individual groups to feel united under the same banner. The Ramgharia Gurdwara label takes it's name from the great Ramgharia misl. Baba Jassa Singh Ramgharia led campaigns to fight injustice and tyranny which helped establish 'Khalsa Raj' and the establishment of gurmat Rehat Maryada. Again, we should be seeing the parallels with Sant Baba Jarnail Singh Khalsa Bhindrawalay and the mahan shaheeds of 1984. We should be communicating the parallels of the 'Khalsa Raj' with Khalistan.

I think we all fully understand how all the previous caste prejudices eventually resulted in the caste system being dangerously "institutionalised" in many of our Guru Ghars. The issue now is how can we seriously get over it to work towards the Khalsa's common goals? Institutionalised caste acceptance not only segregates our interaction with each other but skews and adds bias when standing up for Gurmat asool. That thinking even stops us accepting each other's shaheediya or kurbaniya.

Khalistan - some misconceptions. As Khalistan has become a hot topic with everyone at the moment, I seem to be finding myself entering into many discussions with all sorts of Sikhs over the last few days. I think that now many of us are bringing Khalistan to the forefront, we really need to battle the stigmas and misconceptions that exist out there. Yesterday I ended up in a deep discussion with a very respected middle aged Gurmukh who's from an East African Ramgharia background about Khalistan. This Singh is a very humble sewadar with a lot of Gurbani knowledge and has a deep involvement in sewa. He is always at the Gurdwara carrying out sewa and regularly does raul sewa too. A large portion of Sikhs from Ramgharia backgrounds in the UK, particularly from East African backgrounds have been led to believe that Khalistan was (and is) a medieval feudal battle over land in Punjab. Some of the past terms or references I have heard is that Khalistan is a "Jatistan", a land ruled by Jats. Now, there's no denying that during the 70s/80's our Grandparents/Parents with backward thinking isolated one another by not integrating with each other based on caste, but the long term effects of that were that real legitimate panthic issues became stigmatised with the same discrimatory culture. The advent of committees taking over UK Gurdwaras during the 80's under the banner of Khalistan also isolated East African Ramgharia run Gurdwaras. Many of the Ramgharia Caste driven Gurdwara committees built defence mechanisms within their Gurdwara constitutions so that only people from Ramgharia backgrounds could enter their committees with the view that the Khalistan thinking could not enter. The idea being that the supporters of Khalistan were predominantly from Jat backgrounds and that ideology of Khalistan was not that of what a non-Jat should be involved in. Now I know that many of us are guilty at some point of harbouring prejudices against each other based on caste, but there is no benefit whatsoever by just moaning about the status quo and not putting the real parchar forward. There should be no reason for this thinking to still exist in the UK in 2011 as all it is does is dilute any potential collective power we can leverage off against. Those of us who believe that we (Khalsa) are capable of bringing reforms back into Punjab and Gurdwara Maryada via a Sikh homeland need to work on influencing our own community into feeling empowered about how a Khalistan will work. The Gursikh ideals that Sant Baba Jarnail Singh Khalsa Bhindrawalay stood for are no different to the ideals that Baba Jassa Singh Ramgharia stood for 250 years earlier in the same part of the world. Nothing really changes, the asools are still the same. We need to start looking at our history and drawing parallels so that we can put things into context and effectively communicate them. We will not win any global influence if we cannot articulately describe why we need a Khalistan, and convince our own Sikhs why it's part of a bigger picture. Perhaps we can discuss other common stigmas, misconceptions our community seem to have regarding Sikh homeland on this thread? This is just one issue that has come up in a personal discussion I had with a fellow Sikh.

Bhai Harbans Singh Jagadhari Wale was a bit of an early iconic keertani for us kids of the 80s and 90s. We didn't have many audios to listen to so Jaghadhari wale's keertan/katha is what many of us oldies grew up on. I cannot deny his soft style of keertan, distinct soft voice and face was an soothing influence in my childhood and perhaps helped encourage me on my Sikhi path. I feel like downloading some of his keertan for that nostaligic feeling of being a kid again...

I don't know what it is like where you guys live, but the freshies provide the backbone in the sewa in our local Gurdwaras. My observation is that the "settled" Sikhs are not so keen on certain sewas in my local Guru Ghars nowadays, the freshie fauji's are always there doing the sewas most of us seem too proud to do. (panday di sewa, cleaning the big patilay, cleaning the toliets, mopping the floor, making the parshaday etc) During amrit vela parkash and sukhasan of Mahraj's saroop the main make up of the sangat are the freshies in proportion to the "settled" Sikhs.

Will be thinking of our sister in our ardas this evening...

From 1710 when the first "People's Republic led by the Khalsa" was carved out, the Sikhs were a sovereign people up to the middle of the nineteenth century. In the year 1918 the Montague-Chelmsford Report on Indian Constitutional Reforms recognised the Sikhs as an independent political identity. Historical evidence clearly tells us that the periods of stability and religious secularism in the region of Punjab mainly occurred during times of Khalsa rule. There is no reason for Khalistan to be any different providing the Khalsa ideals are adhered to by the administration.

There's a few other posters also flying around, see below. I have seen very few up in the Gurdwaras so far. Only got 25 days to promote this and try to reach the 125,000 target

Just got a text saying there is a LIVE show covering this issue on Sikh Channel tonight at 8pm.

I must have missed the BBC coverage. Was it on the news, have you got a link? THanks

The show should be repeated (that's if it hasn't been banned!) on Thursday 10pm (GMT) on sky ch 840 or www.sikhchannel.tv Best to contact sikh channel 0121 380 1050 and request them to upload it on their website or contact Mr Bal himself on dsb@sikhchannel.tv

What do Gursikh families do with the remains of the kirpan and kara after they collect the ashes of a Gurmukh from the crematorium? The sarbloh does not burn, so how do we appropriately sanskar those kakaars with satkaar? Does anyone have any experience or perhaps advise what is done in Punjab? There's an interesting article below from the BBC about metalwork recovered from crematoria ash in which a Sikh "ceremonial dagger" is mentioned. http://www.bbc.co.uk...-wales-13071572

It's really up to each of us to ensure we are able to use the June 5th Rally as leverage...and the only way that will happen is through mass attendance. In terms of covering costs of coaches, if the Gurdwara Committee refuse to fund a coach then it's a modest cost that has to be picked up the sangat. We can't keep letting the lack of Committee support act as a "bottleneck" or even brick wall in taking the vital sewas forward. Each one of us is a parcharak and we have to seriously get out of our comfort zones to realise that we must rise up to that role. Khalistan can be intelligently and articulately discussed in all our parchaar, there is no reason to shy away from the right to bring positive changes into Punjab and to safeguard Akal Takht Maryada. How long can we let the stigmas of Self-Rule drag our own self-esteem down and use it to doubt our kaum's capability to govern a country! The Freedom Rally gives us the opportunity to feel united and focused on a long term politcal plan, it also acts as a revolutionary message to the agencies in India that there is a revival in opposition against their campaign of Sikh cleansing which is still taking place India.

Interesting stuff! Does this mean the horses in Punjab today, which I assume are mainly of the Arabian breed, are smaller than the horses during the times of the Gurus? The horses we see with modern day Nihang Singhs in Punjab seem smaller and less muscular than the military horses we see in the west and I often wondered whether they qualify for warfare.