82% of Sikh youth pray - could we be turning the corner

[proactive]

 

Interesting survey done in India and sponsored by a German organisation.

Could we be turning the corner and becoming more religious and less secular.  I have also seen how Sikhs are now getting more religious especially in the west and maybe now the trend is being mirrored in India. 

82% Sikh youth pray frequently, highly religious compared to others, shows CSDS-Lokniti survey (theprint.in)

[californiasardar1]

49 minutes ago, proactive said:

 

Interesting survey done in India and sponsored by a German organisation.

Could we be turning the corner and becoming more religious and less secular.  I have also seen how Sikhs are now getting more religious especially in the west and maybe now the trend is being mirrored in India. 

82% Sikh youth pray frequently, highly religious compared to others, shows CSDS-Lokniti survey (theprint.in)

 

I don't know if something like "Waheguru, help me get into medical school" (which probably accounts for most of the "praying") is prayer in the real sense

[Dsinghd]

Punjab is where Sikhi was born and grew up. It’s nice to see it growing again over there.

However Sikhi has gone global.

[SikhKosh]

While the panthic cause seemed lost just a decade ago, we seem to have reached a period with possible interesting and exciting times ahead for the Sikh nation. If Sikhs act with foresight a lot can be achieved because a lot of factors have aligned in favor of a renewal of Sikhs as a major power (broad context).

There are several factors at play.

A) Sikhs have become media savvy over the past decade. Several Sikh channels, reporters and social media accounts cover incidents related to the wider Sikh community with minute details. While we seem to always see the negative aspect (Sikhs feuding on social media over trivial issues, maryada and so on), the wider positive aspect can not be ignored.

Besides that, turbaned Sikhs are viewed more favorably in non Sikh media compared to just 15 years back. The trend probably started with Diljit and Singh is Kinng. Somehow, a lot of Punjabi artists seemed to get back to Sikhi as well (Raj Kakra, AS Kang, Kay V Singh, ...). The rise and global acceptance of Punjabi songs, as much as they're bashed for their anti Gurmat content here, led to a wider acceptance of turbaned Sikhs even internationally. You will find many non Sikh Indian, Pakistani and female fans from other countries who adore sardars, something which was uncommon years. 

B) Increasing closeness with Pakistani Punjabis and north Indian Jaats.

1) The same Punjabi movies and songs mentioned above created a sense of longing among many Pakistani Punjabis because even after 6 decades of trying to become Islamicized and Urdufied, they couldn't take out the Punjabiat from their blood.
The Pakistanis generally prefer Sardars over Hindus, but the continous support of Sikhs to Muslims of India made them even more favorable in the eyes of Pakistanis (not that I support blindly supporting any qaum, be it Muslims or Hindus). The Kartarpur corridor opening had also a major help in bettering the relations between Sikhs and Pakistani Punjabis. To the extent that Paki Punjabis take their women folk to Kartarpur to show them Sikhs and talk to them. 

2) The farmers movement helped Sikhi get out of Punjab. The first impacts were seen during the Morcha, but the seed of Jaat-Hindutva alienation was planted earlier with the Jaat Arakshan just a few years back. A lot of Hindu Jaats of Haryana have embraced Sikhi and will continue to do so in the near future. A panel has to be created which is only occupied with affairs related to these new Sikhs and makes them feel at ease in the Panthic atmosphere. We need to respect their cultural identity and refrain from forcing Punjabiat upon them (I'm already seeing comments on youtube where Punjabi Sikhs are asking these Haryanvi Jaat Sikhs to talk in Punjabi - Punjabi is not a Sikh language, the GGS has many languages, so let them have their own language and learn Gurmukhi).

The Jaat movement will in turn trigger other castes to embrace Sikhi as well because they're seen as powerful.

C) The younger Sikh generation is more aware, street sharp and politically informed than the previous generation of Sikhs.

We were not able to counter propaganda few decades back the way we do now. I see young, informed, well read Sikhs on youtube, twitter which was not the case even a few years back. These young Sikhs often have knowledge ranging from puratan granths to recent historical events (1984).

We lost one generation to genocide and migration (especially the ones born between 1950 and 1970). The middle generation was lost mentally, often antipathic to the Sikh cause, busy in drugs and so on. In a void which was created by the lack of Parchaar and decent leaders, the state atrocities/anger/lack of opportunities led to the rise of gangsters in Punjab. Had there been a proper structure, this energy could've been channelized in a more productive way. You can see how the gangsters became close to kharkoos in jail and even became involved in Khalistan activities - showing how the Punjabi youth remains inclined to fight for Panthic causes if they're properly guided.

The new generation seems to know whats up and is aware. The political correctness is being challenged (and rightly so). The relations with Pak Muslims and northern Indian Jaats have never been better. Sikhs are globally respected due to their charitable activities, the image (saroop) has become acceptable and even attractive, Sikhs are major political powers in some western countries.
Major wonders can happen, only if serious and intelligent leaders appear in the coming years. 

Akaal Sahai

[proactive]

9 hours ago, SikhKosh said:

While the panthic cause seemed lost just a decade ago, we seem to have reached a period with possible interesting and exciting times ahead for the Sikh nation. If Sikhs act with foresight a lot can be achieved because a lot of factors have aligned in favor of a renewal of Sikhs as a major power (broad context).

There are several factors at play.

A) Sikhs have become media savvy over the past decade. Several Sikh channels, reporters and social media accounts cover incidents related to the wider Sikh community with minute details. While we seem to always see the negative aspect (Sikhs feuding on social media over trivial issues, maryada and so on), the wider positive aspect can not be ignored.

Besides that, turbaned Sikhs are viewed more favorably in non Sikh media compared to just 15 years back. The trend probably started with Diljit and Singh is Kinng. Somehow, a lot of Punjabi artists seemed to get back to Sikhi as well (Raj Kakra, AS Kang, Kay V Singh, ...). The rise and global acceptance of Punjabi songs, as much as they're bashed for their anti Gurmat content here, led to a wider acceptance of turbaned Sikhs even internationally. You will find many non Sikh Indian, Pakistani and female fans from other countries who adore sardars, something which was uncommon years. 

Very true. We cannot underestimate the importance of social media especially in a community like ours who are less likely to read newspapers than others. With social media we instantly get videos of an incident before the govt owned print media or Godi TV channels have a time to frame it into their own narrative. We can just imagine if there had been no video of the beadbi at Harmandir Sahib, the framing would have been that extremist Sikhs have murdered an innocent Hindu and given how a lot of our own people are quite willing to believe the worst about our own people, that narrative would have got a lot of traction.  The importance of social media is that people are not liable to be brainwashed by the govt media such as happened in the 1980s. SM also stopped Ranjit Singh who was arrested for attempted murder when the BJP goon were sent to the andolan sites to attack the Kisans from being framed and without SM he would never have got bail. 

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B) Increasing closeness with Pakistani Punjabis and north Indian Jaats.

1) The same Punjabi movies and songs mentioned above created a sense of longing among many Pakistani Punjabis because even after 6 decades of trying to become Islamicized and Urdufied, they couldn't take out the Punjabiat from their blood.
The Pakistanis generally prefer Sardars over Hindus, but the continous support of Sikhs to Muslims of India made them even more favorable in the eyes of Pakistanis (not that I support blindly supporting any qaum, be it Muslims or Hindus). The Kartarpur corridor opening had also a major help in bettering the relations between Sikhs and Pakistani Punjabis. To the extent that Paki Punjabis take their women folk to Kartarpur to show them Sikhs and talk to them. 

I would be careful with one aspect. Closeness with the Pakistanis can only be detrimental to us. It might help to pi$$ of the RW Hindu and show that we are not brain dead Indian nationalists but with the Pakistanis you cannot play the 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' game. It will always hurt us in the end. The way I look at it is, that the nationalist Indian is our enemy at the moment but the Pakistani is our enemy for all time. The Kartarpur corridor has been an important step in allowing an increasing number of us to visit an important Gurdwara in Pakistan, something that we pray for everyday in our Ardas, but we should not take this as some overwhelming acceptance of us by these people. The way they view us today is the way that Hindus viewed us in 1947 as a people who can be used against the Muslims and once the Muslim threat is over can then be discarded. We need to learn from history otherwise we will be condemned to repeat it. 

On the Jaat issue, I agree we need to increase our population through parchar as much as we can and we need to increase our reach to people who are both sympathetic to us which includes any Hindu in India and who in future could provide us with more numbers and increased political influence. The way I see it, North India will see a major confrontation and possibly civil war between the Hindus and the Muslims. We can either remain neutral and go full liberal and help those of either side who suffer in which case we will gain nothing and possibly lose Punjab because the Muslims suffering in the cow belt will seek refuge in Punjab and this will only lead to more danger for Punjab as they increase their population and gain more political power with liberal Punjabi politicians giving in to them in the hope for more votes. On the other side we could project ourselves as the hope for North India against increasing Islamification. In a sense we will be going back to what north India was in the period after the founding of the Khalsa and Banda Singh Bahadur when we had the potential if things had gone our way to replacing the Mughal empire with a Khalsa empire by force of arms. We have already seen that the RW Hindu is being increasing divided into those who are quite willing to demonise us and lump us in with the Muslims as a danger to India and those who see that our history and philosophy has the potential to rescue north India from the increasing threat of Islam. We need to play the Dharmic angle because in true Dharma, if today Hindus are 80%, Sikhs 2% there is nothing dangerous in one day Sikhs being 80% and Hindus being 2%. 

What is interesting is that while we have increasing liberalised our own history trying to present our ancestors as some kind of liberal supermen who were able to secularise Punjab when secularism was unknown to the outside world. But the way the Hindus see us is that we are the descendants of those who were able to successfully stem the tide of Islam (not Islamic invaders) and save north India from Islamification. The truth may lie somewhere in between but it is much more towards the latter than the former. Our ancestors had a no nonsense attitude to Islam, take a Sikh from any time between 1699 to 1980s and they would be astounded at how far we have liberalised ourselves and thus lost any potential to take north India which was always the aim of the Khalsa. 

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The new generation seems to know whats up and is aware. The political correctness is being challenged (and rightly so). The relations with Pak Muslims and northern Indian Jaats have never been better. Sikhs are globally respected due to their charitable activities, the image (saroop) has become acceptable and even attractive, Sikhs are major political powers in some western countries.
Major wonders can happen, only if serious and intelligent leaders appear in the coming years. 

This I see as the major danger facing our people. Unless we actively and forcefully negate and ridicule the liberalism that some are espousing in our people we will lose any struggle before we have the chance to take the field. We are witnessing that death of the greatest superpower on the planet through liberalism and woke culture and its supplanting by a rising power that has rejected liberalism and woke culture. The USA will be finished as a superpower not through war but because it willingly allowed itself to be taken over by woke culture. If we allow ourselves to also be taken over by liberalism and woke culture then it doesn't matter whether we are 25 million or 250 million, our destruction as a people of potential will be a certainty. 

[SikhKosh]

I do not agree completely on the Pak Muslim angle. While we have to be aware of the Pak Muslims and the agenda of ISI (them utilizing Sikhs against India), these renewed relations can be used by visionary Sikh leaders for many purposes (many of which should not be discussed on public forums). This is a tricky one, needs a different approach than the renewed Sikh-Jaat relations but can yield positive results if done properly:

- Rebuilding other Gurdwaras, historical places related to Sikhs, recovering Gurdwaras that were converted into schools and so on, organising exhibitions and increasing awareness of Sikh rule and Sikh past of Pakistan for the general population (this is being acknowledged by Pak Muslims much more than before - there are restaurants with Sikh historical paintings in Lahore and so on). 

- increase of parchar among non Muslim Pakistanis (Hindus and Christians) with state 'approval'

- Focusing on Pakistani (Muslim) Juts and other common castes, not for conversion, but creation of cultural organisations (Unionist Mission, and so on) for exchanging ideas, and so on thus increasing their overall closeness to the Sikh cause. I have talked to many Pakistani Juts, many of whom have Sikh ancestry, and they have a soft corner for Sikhs being Juts and consider themselves different to other Pak Muslims.

 

[GurjantGnostic]

11 minutes ago, SikhKosh said:

I do not agree completely on the Pak Muslim angle. While we have to be aware of the Pak Muslims and the agenda of ISI (them utilizing Sikhs against India), these renewed relations can be used by visionary Sikh leaders for many purposes (many of which should not be discussed on public forums). This is a tricky one, needs a different approach than the renewed Sikh-Jaat relations but can yield positive results if done properly:

- Rebuilding other Gurdwaras, historical places related to Sikhs, recovering Gurdwaras that were converted into schools and so on, organising exhibitions and increasing awareness of Sikh rule and Sikh past of Pakistan for the general population (this is being acknowledged by Pak Muslims much more than before - there are restaurants with Sikh historical paintings in Lahore and so on). 

- increase of parchar among non Muslim Pakistanis (Hindus and Christians) with state 'approval'

- Focusing on Pakistani (Muslim) Juts and other common castes, not for conversion, but creation of cultural organisations (Unionist Mission, and so on) for exchanging ideas, and so on thus increasing their overall closeness to the Sikh cause. I have talked to many Pakistani Juts, many of whom have Sikh ancestry, and they have a soft corner for Sikhs being Juts and consider themselves different to other Pak Muslims.

 

Machiavelli seems of the mind you cannot or should not ally with anyone more powerful than you are. Because you become sacrificial in their war, and if you do help them win, you cannot defeat them, so you've signed on for subjegation. 

[SikhKosh]

I am not saying Sikhs to go protest against CAA, support Muslims against every Hindutva move, I am not saying that we have to condemn the Hindu right wing for every move (especially if their move is beneficial for Sikhs) but we have to start taking carefully calculated steps where we do not become subjugated, cannon fodder for either India or Pakistan but maintain our own identity, remain neutral and yet let both Hindus and Muslims feel they need us and are close to us. It is time for us to learn from Chanakya Niti and stop being emotional fools.

[Premi5]

24 minutes ago, SikhKosh said:

I do not agree completely on the Pak Muslim angle. While we have to be aware of the Pak Muslims and the agenda of ISI (them utilizing Sikhs against India), these renewed relations can be used by visionary Sikh leaders for many purposes (many of which should not be discussed on public forums). This is a tricky one, needs a different approach than the renewed Sikh-Jaat relations but can yield positive results if done properly:

- Rebuilding other Gurdwaras, historical places related to Sikhs, recovering Gurdwaras that were converted into schools and so on, organising exhibitions and increasing awareness of Sikh rule and Sikh past of Pakistan for the general population (this is being acknowledged by Pak Muslims much more than before - there are restaurants with Sikh historical paintings in Lahore and so on). 

- increase of parchar among non Muslim Pakistanis (Hindus and Christians) with state 'approval'

- Focusing on Pakistani (Muslim) Juts and other common castes, not for conversion, but creation of cultural organisations (Unionist Mission, and so on) for exchanging ideas, and so on thus increasing their overall closeness to the Sikh cause. I have talked to many Pakistani Juts, many of whom have Sikh ancestry, and they have a soft corner for Sikhs being Juts and consider themselves different to other Pak Muslims.

 

Indian and Pakistani Panjab already have 'friendly' relationship. But that has not stopped destruction of some historical Gurdware, forced conversions and 'love jihad' and allowing preachers to speak hatefully about Sikhs.

Sikhs will always have to watch their back. Trust cannot be given to them freely and fully. 

Why did their ancestors become Muslim ? Why do they not convert back to Sikhi ?

[SikhKosh]

If medieval Sikhs had the intellect and foresight to accept Nawabi from the same Mughal government that hunted them for decades, we need to play our cards smartly as well. The situation of Sikhs today is not much better than at the times of Nawab Kapoor Singh because we have no real political power.

I condemn Hindu and Islamic terror, from love jihad to RSS inspired ethnicide. But I stay firm on the principle that we need to utilize every opportunity which can be in our favor, all while remaining cautious.

Everything you say is true, but the Pak Govt response to the incidents, despite being an Islamic republic, were pretty decent and swift. We all know they have an hidden agenda to use Sikhs, but we have to be smarter than both them and the Hindus and play our cards well.

All the points I suggested in my earlier posts will not have any negative repercussions, unlike the woke Sikhs that want us to allow namaaz in Gurdwaras, rebuild all mosques in East Punjab and so on.