World Sikh foundation to open a Sikh university in Himachal

World Sikh foundation to open a Sikh university in Himachal
Aug 28th, 2009 | By Shalender Kalra

Nahan: World Sikh foundation has decided to open a Sikh university of international standards at Paonta sahib in Himachal. For the purpose the foundation have constituted a committee for identifying the land. Interacting with media persons at Paonta sahib today the chairman of the foundation Prof Jaswant Singh Mann said that GURU GOVIND SINGH JI had spent four and half years at Paonta sahib during the time he tried the expansion of education at this town. He also informed the media persons that around 500 corers would be spent on the opening of the university in different levels. Chairman of the foundation also said that the informal dialogue was already being done with the chief Minister Prof prem Kumar Dhumal on the project. He added that the similar university would also be opened in Srinagar of Jand K.

Prof Mann said that the land was already identified in Srinagar. He said that before July 2010 the first phase of the Sikh university would be completed. He also urged the local people to support the project in the welfare of the society. He also announced the members of the committee for identifying the land.


with thanks : source : http://nvonews.com/2009/08/28/world-sikh-foundation-to-open-a-sikh-university-in-himachal/

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Let turban wearing Sikhs join US military: Lawmakers

Let turban wearing Sikhs join US military: Lawmakers
IANS 28 August 2009, 01:08pm IST

NEW YORK: Forty-one members of the US House of Representatives have written to defense secretary Robert Gates to permit Sikhs wearing their
religious symbols to join the military.

Sikh organisations have been lobbying with US lawmakers after the refusal by the army to let two Sikhs with turbans join active duty a few months ago.

Captain Kamaljit Singh Kalsi, a doctor, and Second Lieutenant Tejdeep Singh Rattan, a dentist, were told to remove their turbans by the military when they were about to enter active duty after completing their preliminary programme.

In their letter to Gates, the lawmakers say: "We do not believe that any American should have to choose between his religion and service to our country, and urge you to take all necessary steps to ensure that these two officers - and other Sikhs that may wish to serve - are able to maintain their articles of faith.

"Including Sikh Americans will enrich the military's understanding of diverse cultures, languages, and religions, thereby allowing us to fully appreciate not only the rich fabric of our own country but also the lands where we send our soldiers into harm's way."

Citing the example of Canada, Sweden and other countries where Sikhs are allowed to wear their symbols in the armed forces, Sikh organisations led by Sikh Coalition have urged Secretary Gates to end this discrimination by the US army.

The coalition said they will continue their 'Sikh right to serve' campaign till the US military changes its "exclusionary policy" against Sikhs.

with thanks : source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS/World/US/Let-turban-wearing-Sikhs-join-US-military-Lawmakers/articleshow/4944410.cms

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Sad demise - a girl student from Belgium expired

We are very sorry to inform you that Laleman Tine, bachelor student of Theology and Religious Studies of the Delegation from the Interdisciplinary Centre for the Study of Religion & Worldview, K.U.Leuven, Belgium, Expired in Leh on 27th August.

The delegation was in Gurdwara Rakab ganj sahib for 3 days, earlier in this month for studying Sikhism. The delegation will be in Delhi on Sunday, on the last day of the trip as they have to catch the late night flight. For more details please contact Dr.Gurdeep kaur - Cell number 9811317078

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His beard is taller than you

His beard is taller than you
August 26, 2009 04:38:00 PM
By Ashley Gebb/Appeal-Democrat

At 7 feet, 8-plus inches, Sarwan Singh's beard is quite a sight to behold.

But any emotions the Sikh man holds about the hairs flowing from his face are of gratitude and respect rather than pride. Singh credits God for blessing him with such lengthy wisps, and in accordance with his religion, has not disfigured his body by cutting them.

"God has given a beard to everybody, but he has given him a special gift," said Yuba city resident Sukhcharan Singh.

Sarwan Singh, 43, lives in Surrey, Canada, but has spent the last three weeks at the Gurdwara Sahib on South George Washington Boulevard in Yuba City. Sukhcharan Singh is videotaping the religion and music teacher while he reads the holy scriptures of the Guru Granth Sahib aloud in Punjabi.

The tapes will create a recording for other Sikhs who may not have access or time to practice themselves. To read the Guru Granth Sahib in its entirety would take 80 hours, so the men have broken it down into 2 1/2 hour chunks.

Twice daily, Sarwan Singh prepares for the recording session with a cup of tea to warm his vocal cords, taking care to keep his beard clean while doing so.

It was not until about 10 years ago, when he moved from India to Canada, that Singh realized a knee-length beard was a bit of an oddity. His friends finally urged him to contact Guinness World Records.

The record-keepers measured Singh's strands at 7 feet, 8 inches in November. The previous record was held by Shamsher Singh of Punjab, India, whose beard measured 6 feet long in 1997. The men do not know one another.

Sarwan Singh's recorded length is from chin to tip, but his longest hair sprouts from just above the throat. The beard has since grown a few more inches.

"He might beat his own record!" Sukhcharan Singh said with a laugh.

Previous record-holders, before Guinness changed its standards, boasted beard lengths in the double digits, but bottom hairs were not actually attached and instead clung to matted knots.

A bright white smile peeks out amid Singh's bushy black, silver and gray strands that start around his jaw. The number of hairs gradually dwindle as they near his feet, tapering off at less than 10 wisps for the bottom few inches.

He estimates he spends about half an hour a day shampooing, conditioning and supplementing the hair with natural oils to keep it silky smooth. Speaking through Sukhcharan Singh as translator, he said he occasionally brushes the beard to keep it free from tangling.

Despite all the care and maintenance they demand, Sarwan Singh treats his hairs with patience.

As he talks, reads or simply stands, he gently fingers the tips of silver, gray and black wisps or drapes them over his hands. When a clean surface is available, Singh allows the strands to coil onto the floor; otherwise he wraps the beard into a loose knot below his chin.

The hair on his head, hidden by the traditional Sikh wrap, grows at a normal rate and length, he said.

Singh urges Sikh children to take pride in their religion and be proud to grow their hair. If he can take care of an almost-8-foot-long beard, they can respect God and their bodies, he said.

The beard is somewhat of a fascination among children.

During Singh's first days in Yuba City, Sikh youngsters were clambering around him, eager for photo opportunities. He stood atop an upturned milk crate so his beard could flow nearly all the way to the ground, although never touching the actual floor or dirt.

Every aspect of living with his world-record beard is in honor of and respectful of his religion and his creator, Singh said.

"We have to live this way, with whatever he has given us," he said.

Contact Appeal-Democrat reporter Ashley Gebb at 749-4724 or agebb@appealdemocrat.com

with thanks : source : http://www.appeal-democrat.com/news/singh-85917-beard-sarwan.html

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Dera, Sikh followers clash averted

Dera, Sikh followers clash averted
TNN 26 August 2009, 10:56pm IST

LUDHIANA: A serious clash was averted between dera followers and members of the Sikh community, when the latter objected to the organization of an
‘Akhand Paath’ near the Model Town Extension, on Tuesday night.

Following information that followers of Dera Satkartar Das were allegedly organizing a paath, a large number of people from the Sikh community gathered outside the dera and shouted slogans.

Panicked by the situation, dera followers pelted stones at the gathered crowd. Before the situation could worsen, the police was immediately summoned which reached the spot in no time.

Both parties were pacified and they finally reached a compromise at the Model Town police station. In the meantime, sewadar of the dera, Jaswinder Singh, said the Akhand Paath had been organized to celebrate the birthday of Baba Shri Chand Jee. “I had brought the religious scriptures from the gurdwara and had sought permission from the Akal Takht to do so,” he added.

Meanwhile, some people received minor injuries in the incident.

with thanks : source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/news/city/ludhiana/Dera-Sikh-followers-clash-averted/articleshow/4938262.cms

SikhsIndia
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Ocean of pearls

The trailer begins with the wording, "THE GURU IS THE OCEAN FILLED WITH PEARLS". But a scene in the trailer, where a sikh guy is shown cutting his own hairs is horrible. Sorry, i could not view it as it hurted me a lot.













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Punjab bleeding itself to stay afloat

Punjab bleeding itself to stay afloat
Published on Tuesday, August 25, 2009 by Azaad

Punjab: Deprived of cash flow and faced with a huge subsidy bill, the cash-strapped Punjab government has virtually been selling off over Rs 400 crore of its government securities each month this year, in order to stay afloat.

Since January 2009, the Punjab government has raised Rs 3,458 crore by getting its state development loans (SDL) auctioned through the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). This is not all; Punjab plans to raise Rs 5,000 crore through selling its SDL during this financial year.

In this fiscal alone (since April 2009) Punjab has auctioned its state development loans worth Rs 1,743 crore. With the state government facing additional liability on account of the implementation of recommendations of the Fifth Pay Commission from this month onwards, the state will be raising Rs 500 crore through yet another auction of its SDL by the RBI on August 25.

In spite of the limited resources to raise money, Punjab has a huge annual subsidy bill of Rs 4,500 crore. With the power subsidy bill going up to an astounding Rs 3,142 crore (up from Rs 2,602 crore last year), and no signs of an increase in its revenue, the state is relying heavily on these SDLs to raise money.

Other than the power subsidy, the state government also subsidises the Local Bodies Department for octroi, sewerage and house tax, besides subsidising its populist ‘atta-dal’ scheme. While the government spending is on the rise, revenue growth is barely over 5 per cent for this year.

Talking to The Tribune, Punjab Finance Minister, Manpreet Badal, agreed that the huge subsidy bill of the state was responsible for such heavy borrowings. “Though we are within our prescribed borrowing limit of 3.5 per cent of the gross state domestic product (GSDP), the fact is that we will need more money this year as the power subsidy bill.” It is estimated that the power bill will increase by Rs 542 crore this year on account of increase in per unit cost of power by about 40 paisa.

Official sources in the RBI said that these state development loans are auctioned by various state governments to raise money for their development activities. Generally, banks bid for these loans as they are supposed to invest a certain prescribed percentage of their funds in government securities. Since this investment in government stocks is reckoned as an eligible investment in government securities by banks for the purpose of Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR), banks participate in these auctions. These stocks also qualify for ready forward facility.

with thanks : source : http://sikhsangat.org/2009/08/punjab-bleeding-itself-to-stay-afloat/

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Sex ratio shows positive change

Sex ratio shows positive change
Abantika Ghosh, TNN 26 August 2009, 03:08am IST

NEW DELHI: The Annual Report on Registration of Births and Deaths in Delhi 2008 that was released on Tuesday reinforced the city government's claims
of a drastic improvement in the capital's sex ratio at birth from 848 females per 1,000 males in 2007 to 1,004 in 2008. While the ravings on Laadli continued, the scheme, if the report is to be believed, seems to be working with a distinct religious bias.

While the sex ratio at birth in Hindus and Muslims is 1,002 females per 1,000 males and 1,040 females per 1,000 males respectively, for Sikhs and Christians it is still languishing at 873 and 875, respectively. The figure is way below the acceptable international level of 952 females per 1,000 males and the national average of 933, according to the 2001 data. While officials explain the figures by saying that the number of Christian births in Delhi is too few, for Sikhs they admit that the largely prosperous community which is way outside the ambit of Laadli and notorious for its abhorrence for the girl child they cite the Punjab sex ratio as proof may not still have learnt to accept the birth of a girl.

There are also figures in the report which raise questions as to whether the dramatic improvement in sex ratio is actually an indication of a decrease in female feticide or simply underregistration of male births. In 2008, the number of girls born in institutions for every 1,000 boys was 915 but the same figure for home births stood at an astounding 1,303. Though chief secretary Rakesh Mehta is not willing to accept the hypothesis that there may be underregistration of male births "Parents of boys are usually very particular in these things'', is how he refutes it senior officials in Delhi government say 1,303 is too high a figure to be "natural''.

Explained a senior official: "Laadli in itself is an incentive to register girls. But there is no such incentive to register the birth of a boy child. There is also a chance that girls who were born elsewhere to fathers who are Delhi residents were registered here to take advantage of Laadli. These theories cannot be completely overruled because the only other explanation then would be that there is some amount of male feticide happening which is preposterous.'' Laadli, interestingly, has had just 23,706 registrations at birth in 2008 against an increase in 19,000 of the total number of girls born during the year.

The number of male children born in the city has incidentally gone down from 1.74 lakh in 2007 to 1.66 lakh in 2008. And the figure, somewhat surprisingly, has been constantly going down from 2005 when it stood at 1.78 lakh. The number of girls on the other hand has remained more or less constant over this period before registering a jump from 1.47 lakh in 2007 to 1.67 lakh in 2008.

Commenting on the difference in sex ratios across religions, Mehta though sounded distinctly concerned about the Sikh figures. "The figures are worrying because unlike Christians the number of Sikhs in Delhi would be substantial. Sikhs are prosperous, so Laadli which is for families with an annual income of less than Rs 1 lakh does not affect them. It would have to do with the Punjabi connection. See how bad the sex ratio of Punjab is. Moreover the census figures clearly showed how south Delhi which is home to so many rich Punjabis and Sikhs have one of the worst sex ratios. What one needs to do to address that mindset has to be thought about now.''

The figures also showed that more than 50% women become mothers before the age of 25 years and there is a distinct link between the level of education in women and the number of children they bear. While 42.53% of the fourth (or more) child were born to illiterate women, only 2% were born to graduates.

The death registration figures, on the other hand, show that more than 41% men die between the ages of 35 and 60 whereas the percentage of women of the same age group dying is about 31%. For a city that prides itself on its health infrastructure, a figure that may come as a shock is that the largest percentage (26.72%) of deaths occur due to causes which are not explained "symptoms, signs and abnormal clinical and laboratory findings'' is how the report puts down the cause of these deaths.

with thanks : source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/news/city/delhi/Sex-ratio-shows-positive-change-/articleshow/4934292.cms

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84 case: Trial court rejects CBI claims

84 case: Trial court rejects CBI claims
TNN 26 August 2009, 03:06am IST

NEW DELHI: A trial court on Tuesday dismissed the CBI's contention that it was not under a metropolitan magistrate's jurisdiction to decide on the
agency's probe report giving clean chit to former Union minister Jagdish Tytler in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots case.

After almost five months of gruelling arguments with CBI questioning the jurisdiction of a magisterial court on deciding the matter, additional chief metropolitan magistrate (ACMM) Rakesh Pandit, in his order, decided to hear the closure report on September 23.

Not convinced with CBI's arguments in which they had sought the transfer of the matter to a sessions court, ACMM Pandit said, "This court can take cognizance of the offence exclusively triable by the court of sessions and then can summon the accused who are mentioned in the chargesheet as well as those who are not mentioned therein if it appears to the court that they have also done the offence.''

CBI, which had on April 2 sought to close the case against Tytler claiming there was no sufficient evidence against him, claimed that the matter involved the offence of murder thereby making it exclusively triable by a sessions court.

The alleged role of Tytler in a case related to killing of three persons on November 1, 1984, in the aftermath of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's assassination was reinvestigated by CBI after a court had earlier refused to accept a closure report against him in December, 2007.

The court, which is likely to take up the closure report for hearing on September 23, would now have all the powers to either accept CBI's closure report or reject it and can even issue summons against Tytler as mentioned by it in its nine-page order.

Citing various High Court and Supreme Court's judgment, the court referred to the CPC to conclude that "this court can take cognizance of any offence. The word `any' has been used (in Section 190) to include even those offences which are exclusively triable by the court of sessions.''

During the arguments on the matter, the riot victims' counsel Rebecca M John had earlier contended that a magistrate only takes cognizance of all offences, whether triable by it or not. "The metropolitan magistrate has the power and the right to accept an investigation report, or reject it, and take cognizance of the offence and can decide which accused to summon,'' John argued in the court, terming as "fallacious'' CBI's plea that the magistrate did not have the power to decide on its investigation report.

The case allegedly involving Tytler relates to an incident on November 1, 1984, when a mob had set afire Gurdwara Pulbangash in north Delhi, killing three persons Badal Singh, Thakur Singh and Gurcharan Singh. The CBI had given a clean chit to Tytler in the case and sought prosecution of co-accused Suresh Kumar Panewala for the offence of murder.

with thanks : source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4934220.cms

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Sikh priests protest to save jobs

Groups of Sikh priests have protested an order that could disbar men under the age of 30 and over 60 years to be employed in gurdwaras across Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh.

The priests have been angered by the new plan of the Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee, the apex Sikh shrines management body. The plan is to sack all priests who do not fall within the new age stipulation. This could mean job losses for scores of priests, they said.

SGPC president Avtar Singh Makkar had recently endorsed the new recruitment rules for granthis and paathis (hymn singers) following complaints against younger priests. These ranged from moral turpitude to several instances of devotee collections in gurdwaras.

Insisting there could be no compromise on maintaining the sanctity of the shrines, Mr Makkar called for a list of all Gurdwara employees below 30 years and ordered a thorough verification of each man’s antecedents.

The committee has also sought a fresh appraisal of each priest’s character, conduct, his knowledge of the holy scripture and efficiency in performing various religious rites.

Courtesy : CathNewsIndia

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Court convicts three in 1984 anti-Sikh riots case

Court convicts three in 1984 anti-Sikh riots case

New Delhi, Aug 22 (PTI) A Delhi court today convicted three persons for attempting to murder members of a Sikh family during the 1984 riots and indicted the Delhi Police and the state machinery saying their role at that time "makes our heads hang in shame in the eyes of the world polity."

Additional Sessions Judge Surinder S Rathi held Mangal Sen alias Billa, Brij Mohan Verma and Bhagat Singh guilty of attempt to murder, rioting, dacoity in Shastri Nagar in north Delhi.

While deciding the case, the judge made a strong indictment of the manner in which the Delhi police and the state machinery had acted during the anti-Sikh riots.

with thanks : source : http://www.ptinews.com/news/243010_Court-convicts-three-in-1984-anti-Sikh-riots-case

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