"It Would've Been Better If The British Never Left India.."

[Akaali1]

"It would've been better if the British never left India.." An accurate statement?

[Raju]

better for whom ?

[Akaali1]

For general, and for Sikhs..

[Raju]

For Sikhs it may have been better. But not for rest.

You need to understand core philosophy of India, which is dharma. the British can never provide it because they are too much into deviousness to meet their ends.

India needs a ruler who can treat all equally. And that entity is yet to come.

[Jag_Singh]

"It would've been better if the British never left India.." An accurate statement?

It also would of been better if:

sant jarnail singh bhindranwale were still alive

The chhote sahibjaade were not bricked

the heart of Banda singh bahadur's child was not forced into his mouth

I think you see where I'm going. The past is the past, nothing we can do to change it.

What we can do is learn from our mistakes.

bhul chuk maaf

wjkk wjkf

[aeroo]

totally disagree with this statement. the deep negative impact the British have had on sikhi is commonly underestimated. one must educate themselves and read and understand the history of what the british had done to sikhs. without this understanding and knowledge the usal will just say "yes sikhs would have been better off if the british had stayed as what habve we gained from an independant stae from the indian government".

yes the hindu government has and i would say is still attacking sikhs in a clever way however i would find it insulting for sikhs to say that we would have been better off if the british stayed.

fateh

[Singhstah]

British at that time did a lot against Sikhi,, eg.

==> MORCHA OF RAKAB GANJ

How did it Get Started?

With the transfer of the capital from Calcutta to Delhi in 1911, preparations began to be made to build the Viceregal Lodge opposite the place where Gurdwara Rakab Ganj is situated. The government considered that the old six-cornered enclosures walls of the Gurdwara was too ugly to stand in front of the Viceroy's palace and proposed that it should be demolished. In 1912 under the Land Acquisition Act the government acquired from an accommodating Mahant the whole land lying between the Gurdwara and the outer wall.

The Cheif Khalsa Diwan, whom the British government accepted as the only representative body of the Sikhs, seemed inclined to accept the Government position in view of the fact that the government did not want to do so to injure the feelings of the Sikhs but simply to improve the appearance of the Gurdwara.

On January 14, 1914, the British Indian Government razed the wall of the Gurdwara to the ground on the pretence of making the road straight. The wall was 400 long, 2 feet thick, and 11 feet high. The bricks of this wall were used for the construction of the raod. 50 Bighas of land (about 25 acres) belonging to the Gurdwara was also taken for the purpose of constructing a raod and a sum of Rs. 8000 was deposited to take possession of the Garden within the wall. This wall too was razed to the ground.

The Sikh community was shocked and had justified fears that the whole historical shrine might be demolished in the due course. The Cheif Khalsa Diwan came under fire and was blamed for permitting the British government to commit this act of sacrilege. While the ultra loyalists like Arur Singh, Raja Sir Daljit Singh and Gajjan Singh of Narangwal supported and even encouraged the Government to go ahead with its plan, Sir Sunder Singh Majithia and his Chief Khalsa Diwan Executive soon realized that they has committed a blunder.Sardar Harbans Singh Attari and Sardar Harchand Singh (members of Cheif Khalsa Diwan Executive) walked out of a ChieF Khalsa Diwan meeting by saying that Chief Khalsa Diwan was betraying the Sikhs by its abject submission to the British Government.

The first thing S. Harchand Singh did was to meet with Bhai Sahib Randhir Singh and explain to him the inside story as to how some of the ultra loyalists had sold the interests of the Sikhs to the British government. Only Bhai Sahib Randhir Singh could awaken the masss. Bhai Sahib Randhir Singh took up the cause seriously and brought about the awakening of the type Baba Ram Singh brought some decades ago. The first telegram of strong protest against the demolition of the wall was sent to the Viceroy by him on behalf of his Jatha which he called Tat Khalsa Sangat, Narangwal.

On April 12, 1914 on the Baisakhi festival Bhai Sahib Randhir Singh organized a large Panthic Conference with the help of Baba Jawand Singh Nihang of Patti. Thousands of people attended the conference. A resolution was passed that a strong agitation would be launched to prevent the descration of the historical temple.

Bhai Sahib Randhir Singh announced, he alongwith a Shahidi Jatha of 500 would sacrifice his life to prevent the descration and demolition of the historical shrine. Bhai Sahib Randhir Singh was later arrested under Second Lahore Conspiracy Case and spent about 16-17 years in the Indian prisons.

The wall of Gurdwara Rakab Ganj was rebuilt on April 28, 1921.

(from allaboutsikhs.com website)

[Jujhar Singh]

without the British singh sabha as well as the AKJ wouldn't have been created. Fact.

without the British, sikhi wouldn't be twisted, we wouldn't have so called 'Scholar's' adhering to a British version of Sikhi. Fact.

without the British, there would be no SikhISM. Fact.

In conclusion, the British ruined a religion/way of life. Fact.

If it wasn't for certain groups, sikhi would be 100% destroyed, those groups cannot be mentioned as people will get their elastic kachere in a twist.

The British ruined a perfect way of life, but our people let it happen.

[Matheen]

No, it wouldn't have been better.

It was a long, hard fight to get control of Gurudwaras back from the British - and they were in a bad state when we finally got them, with all sorts of manmat going on.

Without the British, many cults would not have been able to form, Naamdharis wouldn't have any living guru (Baba Ram Singh wouldn't have been exiled, so their instructions not to have a successor would have been adhered to), and most importantly, we would still have an independent, properous Punjab.

Jujhar Singh, your implication that there would be no "SikhISM" without the British is ludicrous. Plenty of Sampardas carried on their traditions regardless of British rule, and there isn't much difference between them.

[Jujhar Singh]

oh yea of course they carried on what the british gave them, like half the chaupai sahib, half the rehraas sahib not to mention the whole Sau Sakhi, Dasam bani debates.

They turned sikhi into Christianity, just how the Victorians used to believe in christianity.