Anand Karaj At 3 Pm ?

[West London Singh]

My sister who lives in Southampton, received a wedding invitation card from a friend of a bhatra sikh background. The card reveals the fact that the elder females of the family tend to have very hindu names such as 'kamla devi' revealing the fact that sikhi is seen as very much a male thing among people of that background.

The wedding is to take place at the bhatra gurdwara in Southampton and the card quite proudly states that the anand karaj will take place at 3 pm in the gurdwara. I find this a bit strange. Perhaps its myself who needs educating a bit more of sikhi but I was under the impression that our anand karaj should be done by noon...at least in an ideal situation...and certainly shouldn't be deliberately done in the late afternoon.

Am I wrong in thinking this ?

[KEERPA]

superstitions are creeping in on everything, Anand Karaaj should be earlier in the morning but if at 3pm I dont see how that can "affect' the marriage etc.

Amrit Sanchaars should be at Amritvela but they now take place during the after noon also?

How about lets be actual Sikhs instead of complaining about everything, while we ourselves follow about 3.7% of Sikhi. Lets all actually be the few "practicing Sikhs" in our families rather than the millions that fall into societies jal

[S1ngh]

I also suggest that Anand Karaj should be done before noon.

[Jagmeet]

The Lavan are written in Raag Sohee, which should ideally be sung between the hours of 9am - 12pm.

I have attended many weddings where the lavan have started very late, some up to 5pm/6pm.

I can't be bothered to write exact details, but its extremely disrespectful to Guru Granth Sahib, who should not be waiting for us, but we should be waiting for Guru Granth Sahib Ji.

[West London Singh]

OK. Just to let you know how it was :

The bharat arrived in coaches, except that they don't call them bharat....everybody referred to them as the 'jang'. Only men. No women at all. We were told that women were not allowed.

Everyone made their way into the Guru Tegh Bahadur Gurdwara on St. Marks Road in Southampton. This gurdwara has only just taken down the 'bhatra sangat' sign from its sign. We went past the langar hall into a seperate hall next door which is also owned by Guru Tegh Bahadur Gurdwara. There....we had the bhatra version of cha and somasas.

Ok. Lets all take a deep breath before I tell you the next bit :

Yes. There was cha. But there were no somasas. Instead, there were people from the girls side, doing seva with heads covered, of giving each and every person a full english breakfast. There were sausages, bacon, fried tomatos, eggs and beans.

After this full english, everyone made their way into the gurdwara.

The common scene, both at the ceremony and the reception was the complete and total seperation of the sexes. At the reception, which was held at the function hall of the Hampshire Constabulary HQ, there was a virtual parda......where women could not under any circumstances step foot in the mens section.

I learn't alot this weekend. I learn't that these kind of anti-sikh practices are thriving because we sikhs are consumed by political correctness. We're so scared of saying anything about people of other 'backgrounds' to ourselves that we're actually burying our heads in the sand, pretending that differences don't exist. Thats a shame.

[Bundha]

bhaji, I do not think this is to do with political correctness.

The Bhatra Bradari are almost a separate community within a community. They seem to have their own rules and regulations and keep very much too themselves. They do keep traditional values, and I am not critisizing whatsover, are have certain attitudes towards men and women.

I remember a long time ago I went to abhatra wedding and my jaw also dropped when I saw eggs and bacon being served in the langar hall in the morning.

The Bharta sangat in Leeds have now split in two, those who want to serve meat and eggs in langar hall and those who do not. Although this is a positive move , in so far as some of the community now feel that meat should not be served in the gurdwara, it does however mean that we now have another gurdwara set up in the city.

[AmarjitKaur]

Vaise menu eh gul kade samajh nahi ayee, ke why its hard for people to stay away from meat, eggs, alcohol, smoking for atleast one day, for few morning hours, when whole week they can satisfy their tongue pleasures by doing whatever they want if they are really in favor of above foods.

Personally, I am against all above for each second of all 365 days.

But because I won't want to convince others of my belief, I would just request them to stay away from above things if they are going to come close to GURU Sahib on a particular day. Do whatever after they are done doing matha tek or somehow coming close to guru sahib.

They are so not caring about/considerate about other people's sentiments that they keep indulging in these foods still.

Consuming above things or not, that has been part of the discussion always and will stay.

The only thing which always convinced me "its not ok to consume forbidden foods", is that all the mahapursh, brahmgiyani, Sant type souls, they don't do it.

So why us humans, who are vista de keere, moorakh, andhe, agiyani ( I can count 20 more names for us, but would stop here) think that we are smart and lets just do it in our ways.

Sadh Sangat ji, never have this doubt in your mind, that consuming above foods is ok. Whenever you do, look at the jeevan of those people who do it. In which way they are fitting into just moolmantar (the first bani Guru Nanak Dev ji uttered). The Moolmanatar is not only to describe the undescribable GOD, but its the qualities we need to bring in ourselves.

And was listeing to Bhai Ram Singh Kathawachak. He mentioned about Ajooni (in moolmantar), it doesn't just mean taking birth and then die. It means the birth and death we go through every second when we turn into different jeevans with our actions and thoughts. e.g., at one moment we are so generous that we want to give to others and at another we are so lobhy (greedy) that we want to snatch from others. These are the joons (birth and deaths) we go through everyday and every moment. We need to rise above these.

Anyways, I took the topic somewhere else. Just sharing whats on mind while discussing the above topic.

[BhForce]

Although an early morning Anand Karaj seems best, I can't really say 3pm wedding is anti-Sikh per se.

As for the English breakfast, LOL!

As for the two separate halls for men and women, I don't really see the problem. That's not anti-Sikh in and of itself. Checking girls/boys out, mixed dancing, copping a feel on the sly, etc., doesn't really seem to me what Guru Nanak Dev ji had in mind when saying women shouldn't be called bad.

[Balait_da_Sher]

As someone from bhatra community i can provide you with facts rather than hearsay. Firstly, in practically every wedding that i have gone in my community women have made up more than half of the barat. There is no such thing as bhatra women arent allowed to do this etc. The only thing i have seen is that women tend to party separate from men. So at the reception the hall is usually divided into two portions, one for men and other for women (would you want your family member dancing with other drunken baratis?). This is the only segregation at wedding. At gurdwara there is the usual divide, women on the left, men on the right.

I just dont know how you can conclude from a hindu sounding name that sikhi in bhatra community is a male thing.

So a typical Bhatra wedding is no different than any other caste in punjabi culture. Usually there are atleast 4 - 5 coaches. 3 ish for women and 2 for men. Bhatra barats (janj not jang) are ALWAYS late. so even though the card says the anand karaj will be at 3pm. You can easily expect it to be between 5pm - 6pm. There is NO superstition behind this. Its just that barats are always late in my community.

Finally about the english breakfast, serving meat in the gurdwara langar hall. This was done in the past and may still be carried out at some Bhatra gurdwaras but as far as i know, there has been a major reform in my community regarding this and all the gurdwares i know about have stopped serving meat. I would suggest that everyone who gets invited to weddings where they serve meat in the gurdwara raise the alarm and name and shame such gurdwaras.

[Bundha]

Balait_da_sher Ji, may I ask why you call it 'your community'?

Do you feel that you belong to the Bhatra community? or part of the sikh community, are they two distinct groups or one part of the other? just curious , do not mean to offend.