by Owen Cole
Real settlement in Britain began in the late 1950s with an influx of economic migrants from Punjab, especially the Hoshiarpur district of the Jullundur doab, the area between the rivers Beas and Sutlej. They were augmented a decade later by families from East African countries which, having gained their independence, were pursuing policies of Africanization. The British Sikh population now stands at 336,000, two-thirds of whom were born in Britain. This is probably the largest Sikh population outside India, though American Sikhs might dispute the assertion. They have been heard to claim that the Sikhs in North America number 1 million. A book published in 1992 gives a population of only 9,500 for the USA. The Canadian census of 1991 gave the number of Sikhs there as 147,400. Attempts to discover the numbers of members of any religion are notoriously difficult to make, unless a religious question is included in the national census, as it is in Australia, which had a population of 7,795 Sikhs in 1991.
Britain’s Sikhs as economic migrants chose to come to the United Kingdom because they were British and had British passports. Some were war veterans who had served in Europe. During the boom years of the 1950s there was plenty of work. They went to the traditional industrial areas, West Yorkshire, Central Lancashire, the East and West Midlands and parts of London. Not many went to similar regions of Scotland, Wales, or Northern Ireland where there was still unemployment, or the mining areas of South Yorkshire or the North-East where the coal industry was already shedding jobs. In brief, in common with all economic migrants through the centuries, they went where they were needed, not where they would compete with the existing labour force. They had little intention of staying permanently in the United Kingdom but legislation during the 1960s confronted them with the choice of bringing families to join them, or leaving Britain eventually to return to Punjab. The vast majority decided to stay and sent for their immediate relatives. ‘Monty’ Panessar’s recent appearances for England’s cricket team were a cause of pride to Sikhs but few other spectators appeared to be interested in his Sikh indentity.
They still maintain close ties with India, sending money to improve the family home or to build gurdwaras, dispensaries or schools. Their children, now grown up and themselves parents, may visit Punjab less frequently. Many have never been to India and declare themselves to be British Sikhs, though experiences of racial discrimination and harassment make them uneasy about their status and future, so some move to what seems a more receptive North America. Events in India since 1984 have reminded them that Punjab is the Sikh homeland.
Sikhism is not a religion which looks for converts but a feature of the American diaspora is the large number of ‘white’, gora, Sikhs. In 1969 an Indian sant, or spiritual teacher, Harbhajan Singh Puri (Yogi Bhajan, to give him his popular name), began teaching kundalini yoga in the USA. Some of his students were attracted by his total lifestyle, which included vegetarianism as well as the usual amritdhari discipline, of daily nam simran (meditation upon the Sikh scriptures), the prohibition of alcohol, tobacco, drugs and sex outside marriage, as well as his Sikh world view stressing equality and service. To these might be added his own strong and attractive personality. In November 1969 the first converts took amrit.
Some doubts were expressed by Punjabi Sikhs when they saw gora Sikhs for the first time, dressed from head to foot in white Punjabi clothes and wearing turbans: both men and women, and their children. They have turned out, however, not to be hippies in transit from one fad to another, but serious Sikhs. Their children have been brought up in the Sikh way; some have even been educated at Sikh schools in India. The movement is sometimes known as 3HO, Healthy, Holy and Happy, and by the end of 1975, 110 centres and 250,000 people were involved in its activities. Its preferred title is Sikh Dharma of the Western Hemisphere. It is also known as the Sikh Dharma Brotherhood. A declared aim of the sant and his followers is to revive Sikh commitment to Khalsa ideals in Western countries where they have often become neglected.
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Insight
The zeal of converts is proverbial as is the enthusiasm, and occasionally the arrogance, of youth. Punjabi attitudes to gora Sikhs have been mixed but they could have an important role to play in enabling the diaspora to distinguish universal Sikh values from those that are Punjabi.
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Cultural changes among Sikhs in Britain
Some readers may have spent time living abroad. Unless they lived in an expatriate enclave, as some do by choice or others are compelled to do, they may have had to decide what to keep and what to discard of their native customs and traditions. Inside the home things need not change – until children begin to question the value of keeping the parental tongue in a strange land, or the Christmas tree and traditional meal – preferring to be like the people around them, especially their new peer group. Sikhs outside India find themselves facing the same kinds of challenges. Distinction between religion and culture tends to be a Western division unfamiliar and incomprehensible to many people of the East, though there are second- and third-generation settlers who are beginning to compartmentalize religious belief and practice and secular life at least to the extent of separating their understanding of the essence of Sikhism from a Punjabi/Indian lifestyle in respect of diet, dress, arranged marriages and language.
Language, however, is not a secular matter for observant Sikhs. The person who compares it with the child from England who goes to live in France, forgets English and causes pain in the family when he can no longer talk to Grandma has missed the point. There is, of course, this kind of distress, but Punjabi is, and will remain, the language of the Sikh religion. Neglect of language cuts Sikhs off from their spiritual heritage in the form of worship in the sangat and ability to understand the Guru Granth Sahib, as well as converse with family elders who are often custodians of the tradition at the popular level, transmitting it to their grandchildren.
Those Sikhs who perceive this danger make a response that may take the form of reinforcing Punjabi culture, particularly in continuing to encourage arranged marriages between families which value the culture. The tendency to bring in a bride or groom from India is decreasing, not so much because of legal hurdles, but because of an awareness of changes in lifestyle among British Sikhs. The prospect of a partner from Punjab reinforcing parental values may be seen to pose a threat to the British bride or groom. This is not to say that arranged marriages in themselves are proving unacceptable. On the contrary, many young Sikhs appreciate the stability they can bring and recognize their advisability in a system where one is marrying into an extended family. It is the danger of marrying out that Sikhs most dread, yet there are many examples of this in America, especially on the west coast. What affinity with Sikhism will the children of these mixed marriages have? The answer depends on the attitude of both parents. Where the non-Sikh partner shares the life of the sangat as far as possible, even if they don’t learn Punjabi, and the community is friendly and receptive, the evidence seems to point to children staying Sikh. When the Sikh spouse is indifferent to their heritage, the children end up in a kind of no-man’s land, prey to the valueless society which tends to surround them.
Changes in religious practice
We have already noted that Sikhs possess a strong sense of community. The Gurus spoke frequently of the sangat, the fellowship of believers, which was essential for spiritual and moral development. Guru Ram Das said:
Just as the poor castor oil plant imbibes the scent of the nearest sandalwood, so wrongdoers become emancipated through the company of the faithful. (AG 861)
In Punjab, however, this does not necessarily mean regular congregational worship of the kind found every Sunday in Britain. Sikhs have no weekly holy day. They should go regularly to the gurdwara and remember God in paying their respects to the Guru Granth Sahib, but much of the daily prayer of devout Sikhs takes place in the home, meditating every morning and evening upon specified compositions found in the scripture. It is at gurpurbs, anniversaries of the birth or death of one of the Gurus,
or at the festivals of Vaisakhi or Divali, when Sikhs are likely to gather as a religious community. In India, in August, they will often travel to a place such as Bakale where Guru Tegh Bahadur was proclaimed Guru or to Goindwal in September to observe the anniversary of the death of Guru Amar Das.
Processions, known as jalous, or nagar kirtan, led by the Guru Granth Sahib and attendants are often a feature of such assemblies.
In the United Kingdom and elsewhere in the dispersion, the gurdwara has become the focus of Sikh life. Rooms in private houses were used by the first settlers; now warehouses, redundant churches or former schools have been converted into gurdwaras and many purpose-built ones have been constructed. There are now well over 100 British gurdwaras; in some cities, there may be as many as four. On Sundays, as the day convenient for Sikhs to meet, they are full. Weddings, held in the open or under marquees in India, take place in gurdwaras at weekends. The formal educational role of the gurdwara exceeds even its importance as a social centre where the elderly gather often for much of the day. Punjabi classes, training in playing the musical instruments used in worship, formal education in religion, all things unnecessary in Punjab, are essential functions of the British gurdwara.
Apparently a distinctive feature of Britain’s community is the establishment of caste gurdwaras. Bhatras, a group ranked very low in the Hindu spectrum of caste, from which Sikhs, Christians and members of other religions derive their status, were the first Sikhs to come to Britain in any number. They established gurdwaras in the ports where they lived. A rented room provided them with a base to leave their belongings and some of their merchandise, which they carried in their heavy suitcases around the towns of the Welsh valleys or Yorkshire. Bhatras, it is said, were professional beggars. When they converted in large numbers to Sikhism they had to find another occupation. Sikhs should not beg. Therefore they became peddlars. The first post-war gurdwaras in Britain were established by Bhatras. When other Sikh groups eventually followed them, however, they preferred not to associate with such lowly Sikhs as soon as possible.
A majority of post-war Sikhs who came from Punjab were Jats, peasant landowners, though in Britain none of them has become a farmer. Socially, they despised not only Bhatras. Sometimes they lived uneasily with another group they regarded as inferior, Ramgarhias, whose occupational background was urban and industrial – owning garages, making and repairing machines (often those used by Jats on their farms). The consequence has sometimes been separate Jat and Ramgarhia gurdwaras. Most Sikh settlers from East Africa, as has been mentioned, were Ramgarhias. Their skills had been invaluable in the development of the British colonies. When they came to Britain in the late 1960s and 1970s, more sophisticated in a Western sense and wealthier than migrants from India, they tended to associate with fellow Ramgarhias and to distance themselves from Jats. Religiously, however, all Sikhs can and do combine for important celebrations and to protest against matters, such as racial harassment, which do not discriminate between Sikh social groups.
Elsewhere in the diaspora, caste gurdwaras do not seem to have developed. Sikhs from America are taken aback by the phenomenon and often express their disapproval of it. One can only speculate upon reasons for this British eccentricity. One obvious explanation is the settlement of several zats in an area whereas in Punjab they might remain distinct, living in different villages. Another may be the actual numbers of Sikhs. Most United Kingdom cities have sufficient Ramgarhia or Jat Sikhs to make the financing of separate gurdwaras feasible. Clearly, Jats and Ramgharias have their own lifestyles which conflict. Perhaps the emergence of separate gurdwaras would be found in other countries if these two groups found themselves living side by side. Conclusions might only be possible, however, when a survey of zats in the USA (where it is claimed that there are now 300 gurdwaras) is carried out and compared with the British situation.
Well-endowed gurdwaras which can afford to do so often employ a granthi who conducts worship, naming ceremonies and weddings, and performs other functions on behalf of the sangat. This person, who can theoretically be male or female but is invariably male, may sometimes be described as a ‘priest’, but this only causes confusion. One of the main tenets of Sikhism is the rejection of the authority of the Vedas and of the brahmin caste as its interpreter and as a ritual mediator between humanity and God.
Outside India, granthis often perform additional educational functions, teaching children to play the instruments used in worship or to read Punjabi, or deal with questions that their peers throw at them which never troubled their parents who grew up in Sikh homes, in a Sikh environment. Their effectiveness varies. Some are highly competent, fluent in English and experts in Sikhi, which knowledge of Sikhism is often called. Others possess only the basic skills required to conduct worship and ceremonies – the functions for which they were trained. So far, all granthis are Punjabi educated. There is no sign, as yet, of a college for granthis being set up in the West, though the need will increase as the cultural distance between Punjab and the dispersion increases.
Sants, like Harbhajan Singh, are important to Sikh life worldwide. They provide personal leadership and may become the focus of devotion, though they take care not to be seen as in any way rivalling the scripture’s authority, or being regarded as gurus in the Hindu sense of the word. In India, a Sikh will go to a sant at his dehra, a settlement or encampment, which is the equivalent of a Hindu ashram. In the diaspora, sant gurdwaras have taken root. Some sants now spend much of their time travelling the world ministering to the needs of their devotees. They often teach their own particular interpretation of Sikhism, perhaps the importance of taking amrit initiation, of holding regular continuous readings of the Guru Granth Sahib, or of being vegetarian, or they may have a healing ministry.
Culture clashes in the dispersion
All male Sikhs are traditionally expected to wear the turban. For those who have been initiated it is essential, as is the kirpan. Some migrant Sikhs made the error of cutting their hair and abandoning the turban when they arrived from India, being assured by Sikhs already here that they would not find employment otherwise. They gradually became more confident and often discovered that the initial advice had been unsound so they readopted the turban and uncut hair.
Some schools, transport authorities and other employers, however, have refused to recognize the right of Sikhs to wear the turban. These disputes are normally resolved quickly. After all, Sikhs had worn turbans in the British army. The first clash with authority in Britain came in 1972 when Parliament legislated that crash helmets should be worn by motorcyclists. In 1976 Parliament passed the Motorcycle Crash Helmets (Religious Exemption) Act ‘to exempt turban-wearing followers of the Sikh religion from the requirement to wear a crash helmet when riding a motorcycle’. Since then, the right to wear the turban has been generally accepted in all areas of British life. It is worn instead of a wig, for example, by a high court judge and, in accordance with an exemption granted in the Employment Act of 1989, instead of a hard hat on some construction sites.
The Sikh kirpan is recognized as having a ceremonial and defensive purpose, and to be an essential part of Sikh dress. Sikh responsibility has ensured that few people have questioned the right of Sikhs to wear it. Some years ago, the British Government signalled its intention of bringing in legislation to ban the carrying of knives. The Home Office assured Sikhs and Scots that their right to wear the kirpan and the skean-dhu would be safeguarded.
Less newsworthy has been a development relating to the use of Sikh names. It took some years for application forms to change ‘Christian name’ to ‘forename’ or ‘given name’, but even longer for some employers, especially the British Nursing Council (BNC), to accept that a Sikh woman’s surname should be ‘Kaur’ and a man’s ‘Singh’. They insisted that a female nurse should register in her father’s surname, otherwise she would be denied registration, even though she had passed all the necessary examinations. Since July 1983, the United Kingdom Central Council for
Nursing, Midwifery and Health Visiting, which succeeded BNC as the registering authority, has adopted the policy of registering ‘practitioners under the names which they would customarily use’.
In some other European countries, Sikh converts have found it difficult or impossible to get their forenames recognized rather than those which are traditionally acceptable. Thus, a convert called Jean-Marie was only recently allowed to change his name to Darshan Singh on his French passport.
Sikhs in continental Europe
Britain has over 100 gurdwaras; in continental Europe Sikhs are few; there is only one gurdwara in France, six in Germany, one in the Netherlands and one each in Denmark, Norway and Sweden. These are converted houses or other buildings bought by Sikhs who have come from India or occasionally the United Kingdom, though there is now a purpose-built gurdwara in Frankfurt (Germany) and one in Italy.
Their location changes frequently as Sikhs move from one part of a country to another or even back to India or Britain. In Moscow, a Sikh student recently attended Guru Nanak gurpurb celebrations at the Indian Embassy and discovered groups of Sikhs gathering in one another’s homes on Sundays to recite Sukhmani Sahib, pray and share langar. Such a meeting might one day lead to the founding of a gurdwara, or the Sikhs who attend it may move on. Europe’s Sikh community outside Britain scarcely exists.