Ad­dress­ing the youth and other par­tic­i­pants at the re­cently held In­ter­na­tional Sikh Con­fer­ence in In­done­sia, Harinder Singh shares views on the fu­ture lead­er­ship build­ing pro­gram re­quired by the com­mu­nity. These were cir­cu­lated in the Spe­cial print edi­tion of the World Sikh News for the con­fer­ence. 

In the bat­tle to solve the Sikh cri­sis, the tide is fi­nally shift­ing. We are be­gin­ning to win the fight, but there is much more work to do and the clock is tick­ing. We must lis­ten to Japuji in­tently for a vivid glimpse of the Di­vine’s dwelling place.  There, the Guru-cen­tered (gur­mukh) re­mains con­nected via mu­si­cal (nadang) and cog­ni­tive (vedang) di­men­sions, in­te­grat­ing right and left brain. And then, ef­fort­lessly, “Lis­ten­ing, the fear of death de­parts.”

Look­ing Back

Thirty-three years ago, 1984 sought to gather de­struc­tive pow­ers from the In­dian state, re­sult­ing in thou­sands of lives lost, mil­lions looted in art, lit­er­a­ture and prop­erty, and un­known num­ber of raped, lives con­verted or lost in obliv­ion.   This past June was the re­minder how three decades ago Pan­jab was sealed, in­vaded, and vi­o­lated. This No­vem­ber is a re­minder how three decades ago in rest of In­dia Sikhs were tar­geted, hunted, and vi­o­lated. Ac­cord­ing to the well-doc­u­mented ev­i­dence by hu­man rights or­ga­ni­za­tions (Amnesty In­ter­na­tional, En­saaf, Hu­man Rights Watch, Physi­cians for Hu­man Rights, etc.) for the next two decades, sim­i­lar events con­tin­ued with im­punity.

It was a plea­sure to share my thoughts & feel­ings on be­half of @SikhRI on how to con­nect with 'linksters' & train them to be rep­re­sen­tarives of the Panth chis­eled by Sabad's In­fi­nite Wis­dom. Re­vival of Sikhi in In­done­sia & across the globe. #NextGen­er­a­tion pic.twit­ter.com/​uDYLxGdJS3

— Harinder Singh (@1Force) De­cem­ber 2, 2017

For­tu­nately, peo­ple around the world be­gan to de­mand real and sub­stan­tial an­swers from the In­dian state. From Van­cou­ver to Toronto, San Fran­cisco to New York, Lon­don to Paris, Am­rit­sar to Ban­ga­lore, Mel­bourne to Auck­land, Sin­ga­pore to Malaysia, there are a grow­ing num­ber of global Sikhs who are talk­ing to their com­mu­ni­ties about the ur­gency of Sikh crises, work­ing to­gether to sup­port so­lu­tions, and de­mand­ing ac­tion from their lead­ers.

Look­ing For­ward

Al­ready, Sikh work, and the work of non-Sikh sup­port­ers, is be­gin­ning to pay off. Ma­jor Sikh Di­as­pora san­gats (Guru-cen­tered com­mu­ni­ties) are com­mit­ting to re­duc­ing their in-fights and in­vest­ing in de­vel­op­ing the Sikh com­mon­wealth. More­over, the rapid spread of much cheaper tech­nol­ogy is em­pow­er­ing Sikhs to dream of and as­sert their sov­er­eignty: men­tally, phys­i­cally, and mon­e­tar­ily. These fac­tors, com­bined with an in­spired group of emerg­ing Sikhs, are open­ing the next chap­ter of Sikhi.  How­ever, we are at cross­roads: Guru-granted Sikh val­ues are now tak­ing a back seat at the cost of be­ing liked by the lo­cal es­tab­lish­ments. We have en­tered a new pe­riod of as­sim­i­la­tion, but we are also now en­ter­ing a next pe­riod of re­vival.

Just met Gul­raj Singh, s/​o Pri­tam Singh, 1 of orig­i­nal founders of INA. Ar­rested by Dutch in Medan, force­fully cut his hair, ex­iled to Java. pic.twit­ter.com/​MN­qowd­WHLJ

— Harinder Singh (@1Force) Oc­to­ber 26, 2016

The Sikh iden­tity cri­sis is a con­tin­ued strug­gle. It will not be re­solved overnight, but it can be solved and we will solve it. We have no choice. Our very fu­ture de­pends on it.

“When Khalsa Eng­lish Medium School was founded in 1931 in Medan, In­done­sia, it was the way for­ward for Sikhs, Tamils, and in­dige­nous In­done­sians. It is no co­in­ci­dent Sar­dar Bal­want Singh grad­u­ated from that very school in 1962, started the first Gur­mat School in Jakarta in 2013, and is now host­ing this global con­fer­ence. Gur­mat-based ide­ol­ogy, value-based lead­er­ship, and com­mu­nity-based in­sti­tu­tions re­main the Sikh way for­ward!”

Sikh world faces big chal­lenges re­lated to iden­tity and char­ac­ter, but chal­lenges pre­sent op­por­tu­ni­ties for ac­tion and in­no­va­tion. To­gether, we can cre­ate a bet­ter fu­ture for all 30 mil­lion Sikhs.

So, let’s get started.  Sikh liv­ing means do­ing things that are good for the Panth and hu­man­ity. For ex­am­ple, feel­ing se­cure in your iden­tity, be­ing aware of how you spend your cap­i­tal (phys­i­cal, in­tel­lec­tual, and fi­nan­cial), and the peo­ple you iden­tify with, and is­sues you sup­port.  All of these seem­ingly small choices and de­ci­sions – es­sen­tially habits – can have great im­pact. Our ac­tions have an im­pact on hu­man­ity and gen­er­a­tions to come.

Met Bal­want Singh, grad­u­ated from Khalsa Eng­lish School Maden 1962, started only Gur­mat school in In­done­sia in Jakarta 2013 #Ba­hasa #Pan­jabi pic.twit­ter.com/​OhDyMTx­tEL

— Harinder Singh (@1Force) Oc­to­ber 26, 2016

“Sikh world faces big chal­lenges re­lated to iden­tity and char­ac­ter, but chal­lenges pre­sent op­por­tu­ni­ties for ac­tion and in­no­va­tion. To­gether, we can cre­ate a bet­ter fu­ture for all 30 mil­lion Sikhs.”

Go­ing Sikh can be dif­fi­cult or over­whelm­ing, es­pe­cially at first. But lit­tle changes can have big im­pact.  Get in­volved at lo­cal as well as Pan­thak lev­els, find out what the Sikh con­cerns are and then work to make pos­i­tive changes to solve (not tem­po­rary fix) the prob­lems. It is no ex­ag­ger­a­tion to say our fu­ture is at stake as our value sys­tem is be­ing re­placed or di­luted. You – wher­ever you re­side on this planet Earth – are much more pow­er­ful than you may think. Act now as an am­bas­sador of Sikhi and con­nect with the Sikh com­mon­wealth to grow the Panth!

What’s Next?

The next phase is about re­viv­ing the Sikh char­ac­ter. Our fore­moth­ers and fore­fa­thers joined the Sikh rev­o­lu­tion not be­cause it was pop­u­lar; rather it freed them.  Sikh spirit for them was go­ing against the grain, iden­ti­fy­ing with the dis­en­fran­chised; it was not a pub­lic re­la­tions ex­er­cise or phil­an­thropy. So, what was their DNA? It was in­spi­ra­tional life borne out of Ik Oankar, trans­lated into ac­tion in daily life.

Re­lax­ing & re­ju­ve­nat­ing break: lo­cal food, cof­fee, cul­ture, his­tory, Sikhs. And a fresh affin­ity with no­ble Kaur Ma­lika the Queen! #Jakarta pic.twit­ter.com/​63aS37C1ss

— Harinder Singh (@1Force) Oc­to­ber 28, 2016

When Khalsa Eng­lish Medium School was founded in 1931 in Medan (In­done­sia), it was the way for­ward for Sikhs, Tamils, and in­dige­nous In­done­sians.  It is no co­in­ci­dent Sar­dar Bal­want Singh grad­u­ated from that very school in 1962, started the first Gur­mat School in Jakarta in 2013, and is now host­ing this global con­fer­ence.  Gur­mat-based ide­ol­ogy, value-based lead­er­ship, and com­mu­nity-based in­sti­tu­tions re­main the Sikh way for­ward!

We must de­velop clar­ity based on Gur­mat-rooted Sikh world­view where our goal is to achieve jus­tice at home, com­mu­nity, and world. We need con­sis­tency in our be­hav­ior that vis­i­bly demon­strates our com­mit­ment to Sikh val­ues of dig­nity and re­spect. And, we need to be cur­rent by be­ing rel­e­vant to the is­sues the world is fac­ing to­day from geo-po­lit­i­cal to eco-the­o­log­i­cal.

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“The devo­tee of the Di­vine needs to be just like the Di­vine” pro­claims Guru Granth Sahib. The Guru chis­els us to be­come Di­vine-like, and that is en­tirely fea­si­ble by be­com­ing Guru-cen­tered in our thought and ac­tion.  We adopted Gu­ru’s doc­trine of Love and Jus­tice, free of vengeance and ha­tred. May our feel­ings im­plore us to chan­nel­ize emo­tions of 1984 to shape 2084!