West London Singh

It would look good if.................................................it was 1997 and every other auntie, grandma, receptionist and lollypop lady didn't have tattoos. It used to be something that made a man stand out. Now, its a statement of being run of the mill and rather bland. It would look good if.................................................you belonged to a religion that didn't specifically forbid tattoos on the body.

Is it ? If its the same 'Akal TV' that already operates in Canada than its gonna be more of a Punjabi cultural channel than a Sikh channel The one and only important issue that needs to be discussed here is this : Who is funding this new 'Akal TV' ? I don't know the answer to that question but if I were an Indian govt operative I would make it a priority to fund a channel purporting to be a Sikh channel whilst espousing the virtues of India.

I've got an old Nokia mobile which is about 9 years old, It's worth about £5 and does nothing but make and receive calls. Even then I've only got it so my wife and children can maintain emergency contact with me whilst I'm at work. And therein lies the answer and cause of your problem. You're a farmer in Punjab. You're out watering the fields. What on earth do you need a smartphone with internet access for ? Are you expecting a call from the United Nations to address the assembly via conference video call ? Get rid of the un-needed internet smart phone. Unless you need it for your business....which you don't.....its like walking around with a porno mag in your pocket. You're a farmer living and working in isolated and lonely environments. Its asking for trouble.

No. Trouble is we're a pretty ghettoised community. We mostly either live in places such as Heston or Smethwick where we gain the impression that most brown people are Sikhs or we live in places like Gravesend and Southampton where we get the impression that all brown people are Sikhs. The truth, however, is very different. For example, whilst Sikhs have a bit of a majority in just 2 boroughs of west London (Hounslow and Ealing), every borough of north London to north west London is absolutely jam packed with Hindus, and that's not even counting the Tamil Hindus of south London. The Muslims, of course, are dominant in every single borough of east London. Gives you a good understanding of how the census is probably right.

I don't need to read that article HSD2 (btw...whatever happened to HSD1?). We're not playing the blame game here. Every man and his dog knows that the violence started with Muslims killing Sikhs and Hindus in west Punjab. As a good, honest, honourable, truthful person though (i.e a Sikh) I cannot turn my head and pretend I don't want to see what my great grandfathers did to the Muslims in doaba. Our reaction may have been understandable to some extent but its pure savagery can never be justified. My own great-grandfather told me stories of how he used to not only cut Muslim women into pieces but actually ripped muslim babies into pieces by pulling their arms off. Worse still is the way that Sikhs (seekers of knowledge and truth) today cover their eyes and ears and pretend that they just don't see and just don't hear. Thats not only a crying shame but such a person cannot, by definition, be a Sikh.

TV dramas probably pay a small part, but I must say that is a rather sweeping generalisation you've made there Kaljugi. They are, in fact, extremely warm hearted and very deep. Really its just a case of them being very outspoken and not knowing the meaning of shyness, timidity etc. If someone wants an obedient shy wife than I'd recommend marrying a girl from England, America or Canada. You don't find girls like that in rural Punjab. You upset them and they'll not only divorce you in an instant they'll make sure you and your family remain mentally, materially and physically scarred for the rest of your life. Really, nothing much has changed since Alexander the Great sent that letter home to his mum after witnessing rural Punjab. From time immemorial they have been well up for a bit of a fight. When the fight doesn't come they positively go looking for it. Either way they ain't comfortable without a fight. Never happy without an argument or two.

:biggrin2: You ain't 'reading' jack mate.....only you're too stupid to see it. I don't know that particular article as I was still in nappies in 1839 far away from Calcutta but what your're 'reading' - but too thick to realise what you were reading - is the version of Shah Shuja that was peddled by both Kushwant Singh and the article by Sawan Singh in the Sikh Review that has since gone on to be reproduced as fact in Sikh information websites such as Sikhwiki. One of them is a 3rd rate slightly unpadh scholar and the other, as you know, is a well known liar of such a magnificent scale that he has mastered the art of distortion and lies. Now....I've asked you before and I'll ask you again : Why is it that every single neutral account of those events shows us Sikhs as stealing the koh-i-noor through deceit , trickery, imprisonment and violence and the only version that states otherwise is the one peddled by our own sikh scholars ? Come back to me when you genuinely have Shah Shuja's 'autobiography' in front of you. Now...I ask you 2 questions : 1) Isn't the very definition of us as 'Sikhs' that fact that we are scholars who continously seek to learn ? 2) Isn't the very essence of us as Sikhs the fact that we are in favour of truthfulness ? We're not talking a numbers game here and you know it. You know we're talking a proportion game. Despite repeated failed attempts to push you in the right direction of being a Sikh...i.e seeking knowledge and the truth, let me give you the little extra help you clearly need to at least get you started on the journey of discovery. To make things more palatable to you lets use non-muslim authors of reports because we know you'll have difficulty in accepting what muslims say. Justice GD Khosla, an Indian in the official Indian report, states that the number of Muslims killed in Indian Punjab was greater than the total number of Sikh and Hindus killed added together in West Punjab (Pakistan). Sir Pendrel Moon also stated that if the total number of Sikhs killed and the total number of Hindus killed were added together, the figure still falls well short of the number of Muslims killed. So what exactly is the root of your argumentative and combatitive nature here Chatanga ? Is is your assertion that all those Muslims were actually killed by South London criminal gangs who had secretly sailed to Punjab in order to do a bit of villiany ? Or perhaps you feel they all died from a rather severe bout of flu and an even more severe shortage of vaccinations ?

You don't need killing Chatanga. You're already about as brain-dead as they come. Mercy is what you need. Wow !! :wow: So what you sayin bruvs ?.....That all the historians and chronicles of the time were lying and only the 3rd rate sikh, slightly un-padh scholars, putting their own spin on it are correct ? Why do you people love arguing with me so much ? Why are you so afraid of seeking and finding the truth ? With the exception of those written with a distorted sikh spin read every single eye-witness and historical acount of how the Sikhs acquired the diamond. Every last one of those accounts paints a picture of us being lying, deceiving, conniving, sneaky little thieves. Whether its the swapping of turbans account or any other, none of the reality resembles the spin our own historians have put on the facts. Instead of arguing with me here why not spend a day at the British Library and read as many unbiased accounts as I have about the matter. Surely that would be more productive. Which brings us on to the number of dead during partition. Again....Are you gonna sit here all day abusing me or are you gonna read the official published reports of the time ? I ain't your dad mate. I ain't here to hold you by the hand and teach you basic internet search strategies. God gave you a brain and god gave you hands. He also gave you eye-hand co-ordination. He gave that for a reason. Use it.

Oh please brother stop arguing with me for no good reason and stop embarassing yourself. You're talking to a man with a masters in Law and you're not only talking about lawsuits where no basis for lawsuits exist but your're also proposing a first in the long history of the common law. For the first time ever, in the history of mankind, you're proposing that dead people can be defamed. Please, just go away and do simple searches on the internet for a breakdown of the dead during partition. Its really not rocket science.

My word Good grief, this is phillistine central. There's nothing wrong with not knowing things but its terrible that you don't possess the ability to find things out. Surely the Punjab Gazateers of that era would be a good start before you go on to the official reports ? Shooting the messenger for telling you something you didn't know is a sign of an extremely simple person. I'm glad you've finally realised this. Its not too late to change.

So lets get this straight : Not only are you unaware of history but you are refusing to do simple searches to find out ? Unless the facts jump down from the ceiling and land on your lamp without you having to lift a finger you refuse to acknowldge them ? :wow:

Thats a ludicrous question Mehtab Singh. We haven't tricked, hoodwinked or lied to any community in order to take their land, so how much more differentiation do you want ? We Sikhs should always be honest about ourselves. Being dishonest becomes a habit and then becomes second nature. That is why we should always be honest about any dishonest things we have done and that is why we are always honest. For example, I have at times here on this forum been honest about the dishonourable way that the Sikh Raj got hold of the Koh-i-Noor. When the ruler of Afghanistan , Shah Shuja, ran to Punjab and sought the help of the Sikhs, we Sikhs told him we would only give him sanctuary in a house in Ludhiana if he gave us the Koh-i-noor diamond....i.e give us the diamond or go back to Afghanistan and die. My parents brought me up to believe that a Sikh must always have honour and that is why I have never joined any campaign to call the koh-i-noor a sikh jewell. Because I don't like the sneaky way we got it I don't wish to have any association with it as part of my history. Honour and truthfulness is a habit of mine. No I will not do that. Its like asking me to provide proof that 7 comes after 6, or k comes after j. It is general knowledge that you can find with even the smallest amount of literary search. If its anecdotal evidence you want that simply ask the bajurgs from doaba and malwa. They'll tell you how, each evening, they used to form into jathas to go hunting for muslim families to kill. Like I said above, honesty, truthfulness and acknowledgement of one's mistakes makes us a more honourable people. Otherwise, if we hide from history, we are no better than the deceitful Hindustanis.

Well, to be fair, we were the biggest killers of innocents in 1947. But acknowledging that fact is part of what you first said, about us consistently being truthful while others have blatantly told lies after lies. Lets suppose, for example, that we got a free Punjab in 1947 and tricked the bhuddist community of Kashmir into throwng their lot with us, by telling them lies about how we will let their homeland be an autonomous nation without any interference from us. Then, as soon as they joined us, we occupied their land, split their land into 3 more new bits, arrested them, tortured them and and then killed them whenever they complained. As Sikhs, both you and I know that we would never be able to tolerate such terrible betrayal and immorality. The Hindustanis, however, are a very different animal. Immorality comes natural to them and honour and ethics are foreign words they do not understand. Instead of feeling shame of the way they have lied and then killed the people that expose their lies, they dance around as if they hold the higher ground. A totally shameless nation full of shameless people.

Sikh kids "singing in the choir" ? :wow: Celebrating christmas with gusto and then going on to "marrying a Mennonite Christian" ? :wow: You see, as I stated in my previous message , this is where things go wrong. When people uneccesarily go and bring Jesus and Christianity into Santa's big day. I suppose its a difference of continents though. Here in England, where Christianity only exists as a museum relic of olden days and the practices of poor immigrants from sub-saharan Africa, any teacher that dares let a Sikh kid to sing in a choir will instantly be disciplined and the school and education authority will face severe punishment. Not that it could even happen in theory though, coz mainstream schools don't have choirs or anything related to christianity. So, having looked at all the evidence, this is my conclusion : Yes, if you are in England, its a good idea for you and your kids to celebrate xmas coz its got diddly squat to do with christianity. No, if you live in America or Canada, where Christianity still exists to any meaningful level, its too risky to expose your kids to it all.

Oh my dear 'Swati', you really do have no understanding of women from Punjab these days. They'd see you coming a mile off and eat you alive :biggrin2: I'm married to one and can echo alot of the posts here in that they inherently love to fight. Absolutely love it. To the original poster I can say that you can't change the way they are. They're constantly ready willing and able for fights, arguments and altercations. Not just for you but with anybody. Unlike alot of Sikh girls born in the west they don't know the meaning of shyness or timidity. You can't change them so you shouldn't even try. You gotta just accept that thats the way they are. In time, you will realise that their fiesty nature is the least of the things that bug you. You'll realise that their most annoying fault is the way that nobody from Punjab ever screws the lid or cap back on tight enough on any beverage or foodstuff. They even deliberately leave the bottle tops of Coke or Pepsi unscrewed because they think the carbonation is a bad thing and coke will taste better without the gas. They even recommend adding salt to coke to get rid of the 'bubbles'.

I disagree. I think Kesri Lehar have actually been very clever. They know people can't board a train unless they're provided with a platform. Once you have them aboard the train you have a captive audience. Some on that train may have got on for different reasons..i.e in order to reach different destinations, but having them on the train is far better than plodding along the tracks with an empty train.

I don't know what xmas is like in Canada but here in England, where Christianity hardly exists anymore, christmas has nothing to do with Jesus and everything to do with the great prophet Santa. The prophet Santa has no religion. He is adored by children of all creeds and faiths. Christmas is a great time for kids. Celebrate it. Just don't go ruining Santa's big day by unecessarily bring Jesus and Christianity into it.

To be fair, your concern about rappers lying on your floor is justified. If, for some reason, the police knock on your door, they tend to quickly notice things like Snoop Doggy Dog laying dead on someone's living room floor. And given their hectic recording and media interview schedule its only a matter of time before their representatives come a 'nockin'. Seriously though......a house is for LIVING in. I like it when homes show signs of LIFE. I do not like homes to resemble dentist's waiting rooms with their clinical look. I don't expect maggots an rats in people's homes when I visit them, but I expect and want to see lovely signs of life. Things like kids toys scattered about.....a few marks made on the walls by the kids....a few dirty dishes. It is these things that differentiate the cozyness of the home from the clinical nature of the doctor's surgery.

The question about 'convenience' is one you should address to yourself. We Sikhs remember all innocent deaths. We don't place one innocent life as more valuable than the other. On that note, both official and unofficial records state that more Muslims were massacred in 1947 Punjab than the total number of Sikhs and Hindus added together. In other words, as unimaginably bad as the 1947 massacre of Sikhs was, imagine if it happened again the following year and then again the year after that. Only then would we reach the number of muslims killed in Punjab during those few weeks. Why do you find it so 'convenient' to forget them ? Were they not somebody's son...somebody's mother....somebody's daughter or brother ?

The only thing we need to learn from 1947 is that the Hindustanis are an inherently dishonest people without the concepts of honour and truth. Jinnah made his promise to the Sikhs, and they were good promises. To counter these promises Nehru, at the All India Congress in Calcutta July 1946, made a promise of his own hoping the Sikhs would choose India and so the whole of Punjab would not go to Pakistan. At that conference he promised the Sikhs of Punjab that they would enjoy a semi-autonomous Punjab with a glow a freedom much akin to the Khalsa raj of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Oh but if we knew then what we know now. If we knew then how the Hindustanis are a people without shame, honour, self-respect. A totaly besharm nation that blatantly lies and then blames the victims of its lies. Sure we should have could have gone our own way in '47 but our biggest mistake was choosing the deceitful liars over the muslims. Lets just take the fact that 99% of Pakistani Sikhs live in the tribal Pathan mountains of Pakistan. This is because in 1947, whilst the Punjab was burning, the pathan muslims were duty bound under their code of honour : Pakhtoonwali, to protect with their lives the lives of their Sikh neighbours. We chose the wrong people. Both made promises but we chose the besharm over the honourable.

Man that picture is uncanny. How did you know I look exactly like that ? Right down to the stick insect thin black arms without hands that wrap around my head inna mutant stylee you have me down to a tee.

If we're talking about the thread about Guru / Waheguru difference / sameness then I echo your feelings Kully. Normally, I restrict myself to martial / political / sociological matters because I don't have a deep enough understanding of spiritual matters. Thats why that particular thread was really quite awesome from a learning perspective. Thought provoking to such an extent that the contents led to deep discussions and contemplation between members of my family. In all honesty, that thread has tought me such important things about my faith that I never knew before but should know. Been reading it after work each day and came home just now with the same idea. Imagine my surprise then to find that the admins had locked it :wow: For me it has arguably been the most educational thread ever in terms of the core belief of Sikhism. What on earth would motivate an Admin into closing it ?

Most of what you just said there is totally at odds with my own extended family's history handed down orally. Of course I can't say that my relation's experience applies to all but I must take their experience as typical. From what the pioneer bajurgs have told me - and I like nothing better than to sit with them and ask - nearly every single Sikh pioneer arrived through Angel Island (san francisco) and from there half went north to Oregon and work as both lumberjacks and railroad workers, and most of these moved to Vancouver after the riots. The other half moved to southern California to what at that time was America's largest Sikh community - In the Imperial Valley near the border with Mexico. Slowly, but surely, the Imperial Valley Sikhs started to move north to areas around Yuba City. You are well within your rights to question the sanity and memory of the bajurgs but never have they told me about any mass movement by even a few to the mid west. Are you perhaps confusing the early 1900 pioners with relatively recent immigrants of the 1960's ?

Obviously Dhaliwal is a jatt name and Kaleka probably is also if you say so although its a name I'm unfamilar with as it doesn't exist much in doaba and I'm no expert on the mid west, but I am not only very familiar but also family connected to the pioneers that came '100 years back' and can assure you that they have absolutely no connection whatsoever with the mid west. The 'Bains' and 'Johal' sides of my family arrived in the west coast of America in the very early 1900's and, like the other Sikhs, were settled in the Imperial Valley of southern California before moving to and settling in northern California, notably Yuba City. If you are privy to information about these pioneers moving to the mid west (wisconsin) you ought to share it with the rest of us. As far as I am aware those mid west sangats are almost entirely made up of relatively recent immigrants setting up businesses in those localities.

I'm the total opposite. I appreciate your gentle tone but don't appreciate your posts. All they do is waste 5 minutes of my life. But you did take the sikhchic article at face value. Thats why you started your thread with a criticism of the UK Sikhs for opposing him. The feelings of the forum members are a good indication of the popular feeling of UK Sikhs and as you can see something like 9 out of 10 UK Sikhs are opposed to Dhundha for causing division among the Sikhs. Logic's not your strong point fella. Its no secret that Gurdwara Committee's are the biggest threat to Sikhism in the west today. They organise alcohol parties in gurdwara halls....they organise stopovers in Hindu Temples to do pooja during nagar kirtans. Why is it that you expect them to listen to their sangat's concerns when it comes to Dhundha ? I already mentioned your lack of observation skills in my first message so there's no need to go over old ground. I visit Canada often as I have as many close relations there on the west coast as I do in England. How is it that my eyes can see the Ramgharia Gurdwaras there whilst your eyes cannot ? In fact I've seen them all over Canada, from Vancouver to Toronto. You may need to get out more often. You might then see the many chamar gurdwaras there also. You don't have the Bhatra or Afghan Gurdwaras because you don't have enough of them in large numbers. For example, the UK does not have any Labana Gurdwara because there are not enough of them here. How silly would we then be to look at the situation in America and their separate Labana temples and come to the conclusion that America is fractured along caste lines ? Whatever level of sillyness that would be you can take it that you are at that level. I've already talked about perception skills and you, so lets not go over that again. Poetic licence. The need to wax lyrical sometimes requires taking liberties otherwise the comedic value of the message which gives it potency is lost. Having said that though, are we to assume that T.Sher Singh has nothing else to do in his life so has sole responsibility to edit the comments on sikhchic on a full time basis ? Does he not know anyone else ? So many questions. Here's some more : Is it T. Singh ? or Sher Singh ? Or is it a fella with the middle name of Sher and thus not a Singh at all ? So am I. But seeing how I am neither a bhatra nor the president of the bhatra appreciation society it is something you'll have to take up with them themselves. You'll have to ask why they keep mentioning their old dravidian language on their websites and you'll probably have to ask the descendents of Denzil Ibbetson and Horace Rose why their great-grandfathers made similar statements in the late 1800's in their 'Glossary of the tribes of the Punjab' in which they articulate how the bhatras moved up to the Punjab after Guru Nanak Dev ji's missionary trip to Sri Lanka. Curiosity is no bad thing Singhster, but you know it is something that can be satisfied with a bit of reading.