The editor of The Sikh Review for 33 years -Saran Singh recently passed away. In this article published in the historic Sikh magazine -The Sikh Review -around some time after the Indian army attack in June 1984, the celebrated bureaucrat and author talks about the vicious campaign in the Indian media about Darbar Sahib -Golden Temple, Amritsar traces the significance of the place for Sikhs and Sikhism. He also traces the roots of Sikhism in the erstwhile USSR and the United States.

DESPITE THE MEDIA’S TUTORED CHORUS TO MALIGN THE HOLIEST OF HOLIES -DARBAR SAHIB, Amritsar, shines with undiminished splendour in the morning light, hallowed by the meditations of countless men of God, the blood of martyrs defending the faith against imperial oppression, a refuge for the sick, the weary and the sinful –

“ਡਿਠੇ ਸਭੇ ਥਾਵ ਨਹੀ ਤੁਧੁ ਜੇਹਿਆ॥
                   ਸ੍ਰੀ ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ, ਅੰਗ 1361

-In the wide world that I have seen, there is no place such as this!
                  Guru Granth Sahib, Page 1361

It is no coincidence that the sacred Amritsar Sarovar is held in esteem by the Mahayana Buddhists. According to Dr Nirman Chandra Sinha, a Pali scholar and one-time Director of the Namgyal Institute of Tibetology in Gangtok, pilgrims from all over Tibet, Bhutan, Sikkim and Mongolia consider the holy pools at Amritsar and Rawalsar (the latter in Himachal Pradesh), the most sacred next only to Bodh Gaya and Varanasi. Indeed, according to Dr Sinha, Buddhist pilgrims from Western Tibet who come via the passes in Western Himalayas often visit only Amritsar and Rawalsar. 

The Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee would be well advised to note this commonality of faith between Sikhism and Buddhism and take special measures for the facility of Buddhist pilgrims, in recognition of this unique heritage of holiness. 

Holy Texts in Strange Lands:
Believe it or not, handwritten copies of Guru Granth Sahib, the Janam Sakhis and other sacred texts of the Sikhs have been found in the Bokhara and Astrakhan areas of the Soviet Union and are currently the treasured possessions of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Academy of Sciences, Leningrad. These manuscripts, belonging to the first and second half of the 19th century, were copied in Central Asia, indicating that Sikhism had developed in far-flung pockets among the key cities of Soviet Russia, in the course of extensive trade and commerce. 

In one of the illustrations attached to the manuscript of Gurbilas, Guru Gobind Singh has been shown as preparing for a hunt. 

Nearer at home, in possession of the Delhi University’s Department of Modern Indian Languages, there is a miniature edition of Guru Granth Sahib, all of its 1430 pages, which is the size of a postage stamp and which is said to have been printed in Germany nearly two hundred years ago. The letters are so small they can be read, only with the aid of a powerful magnifying glass. 

Since the end of Sikh raj, the art of calligraphy has been on the decline for want of patronage. Sacred texts of the Sikhs not only offer a challenge to translators around the globe but also the opportunity to artists and craftsmen to earn a modicum of immortality by the embellishment and floral decoration of the holy scriptures in marble, metal and paper. 

Freedom of Faith in American Democracy:
My mind goes back to another heartwarming recollection emanating from the Associated. Press. Date lined: Fort Monmouth in the USA the 8th January 1974, the news item reported, how Walter McNair, an American soldier who had embraced Sikhism, was declared innocent of breaking military regulations because of wearing long hair under a turban and growing a beard. “I am delighted,” he declared after his acquittal. “I was sure I would be found guilty,” said the 19-year-old Private McNair who was dressed in full uniform complete with a white turban and a blonde beard! 

The Associated Press had then reported that McNair was the fourth Caucasian convert to Sikhism to be tried by the Military Court and the first to be declared innocent. Lt. Col. Robert Morrison,.the one man court-martial, told reporters, afterwards, he could see no legal difference in this case between an enlisted man and a draftee, for the Sikh draftees had already been allowed to keep long hair and beards and wear a turban. 

This, and other similar instances of protection accorded to men of faith, stands in sharp contrast with the open instigation to apostasy and the abandonment of the keshas, as a vital characteristic among young recruits to India’s armed forces which used to be the bulwark of courage and discipline born of the faith in the Sikh’s distinctiveness.