The Sikh Fed­er­a­tion UK, stead­fast in its ad­vo­cacy for Sikh rights, since its in­cep­tion two decades ago, both within the United King­dom and glob­ally, has raised its voice against the on­go­ing per­se­cu­tion of Sikhs, par­tic­u­larly in In­dia on the oc­ca­sion of World Hu­man Rights Day. The Fed­er­a­tion’s un­yield­ing stance against the In­dian gov­ern­men­t’s poli­cies, which echo dis­tress­ing par­al­lels to his­tor­i­cal tyran­nies, and its cam­paigns for jus­tice in high-pro­file cases like Jag­tar Singh Jo­hal’s, are at the fore­front of this strug­gle.
Un­spar­ingly, the Fed­er­a­tion has taken the UK gov­ern­ment to task from time to time and spe­cial men­tion must be made of its well-doc­u­mented cri­tique of the highly bi­ased and his­tor­i­cally in­cor­rect Bloom Re­view about Sikhs.
The Fed­er­a­tion’s mes­sage is clear: the strug­gle for hu­man rights is uni­ver­sal, tran­scend­ing bor­ders and cul­tures, deeply rooted in the teach­ings of the founder of the Sikh faith, who coura­geously cham­pi­oned these val­ues over five cen­turies ago. WSN nar­rates the story of hu­man rights as told by the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion UK.

In an era where the world grap­ples with the ghosts of au­toc­ra­cies past and pre­sent, the Sikh com­mu­nity stands as a tes­ta­ment to the en­dur­ing fight for hu­man rights. On this 75th an­niver­sary of the Uni­ver­sal De­c­la­ra­tion of Hu­man Rights, the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion UK, a van­guard in the pur­suit of Sikh rights, draws in­spi­ra­tion from the pro­found teach­ings of Guru Nanak Sahib Ji, the founder of Sikhism.

The Fed­er­a­tion’s ad­vo­cacy goes be­yond the UK’s po­lit­i­cal land­scape, chal­leng­ing the In­dian gov­ern­men­t’s poli­cies that are likened to au­to­cratic regimes of the past.

The cases of Jag­tar Singh Jo­hal and Av­tar Singh Khanda are em­blem­atic of the broader strug­gle against hu­man rights vi­o­la­tions and the sup­pres­sion of mi­nor­ity voices. Jo­hal’s pro­longed de­ten­tion with­out trial and Khan­da’s mys­te­ri­ous death have be­come ral­ly­ing points for the UK Sikh di­as­pora, de­mand­ing ac­count­abil­ity and jus­tice.

“Guru Nanak’s vi­sion, tran­scend­ing time and bor­ders, re­mains a guid­ing light in our fight against mod­ern-day tyran­nies,” says Dabinder­jit Singh, the Chief Ad­viser to the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion, UK.

“Sac­ri­fices made by the Sikh Gu­rus to pro­tect re­li­gious free­doms, Sikh teach­ings, and the Sikh way of life com­pel Sikhs to be hu­man rights cham­pi­ons,” reads the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion UK state­ment.

Chastis­ing In­dia for its role in de­mean­ing the Sikh com­mu­nity, the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion, of­ten re­ferred to as the po­lit­i­cal party of the Sikhs in the UK states, “Sikhs have rightly stood up to those run­ning In­dia since its cre­ation in Au­gust 1947 and re­fused to sign the first In­dian Con­sti­tu­tion in 1950 that pro­moted as­sim­i­la­tion of Sikhs. We then had con­tin­u­ous dis­crim­i­na­tion against Sikhs and their home­land cul­mi­nat­ing in the 1984 Sikh Geno­cide that has been rec­og­nized by the high­est courts in In­dia and ac­cepted by the rul­ing BJP In­dian gov­ern­ment.”

“In­dia con­tin­ues to in­def­i­nitely de­tain Sikh po­lit­i­cal pris­on­ers and in re­cent months has been caught red-handed in cases of transna­tional re­pres­sion, in­clud­ing the as­sas­si­na­tion of Sikh ac­tivists in the Di­as­pora.”

In­di­a’s de­mo­c­ra­tic de­cline, marked by a wor­ry­ing shift to­wards au­toc­racy, has raised alarms glob­ally. The un­der­min­ing of key in­sti­tu­tions such as the ju­di­ciary, me­dia, and civil so­ci­ety or­ga­ni­za­tions like the BBC, Amnesty In­ter­na­tional, and Green­peace, sig­ni­fies a trou­bling tra­jec­tory.

“The Sikh com­mu­nity, guided by the time­less teach­ings of their founder, will con­tinue to be at the fore­front of this global strug­gle for dig­nity, free­dom, and jus­tice.”

Sikh Fed­er­a­tion, UK

The state­ment of the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion on World Hu­man Rights Day ar­gues that the Hin­dutva ide­ol­ogy cham­pi­oned by the cur­rent In­dian gov­ern­ment poses a sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenge to global peace and hu­man rights. The par­al­lels drawn be­tween the tac­tics of the In­dian gov­ern­ment and those of his­tor­i­cal au­to­crats like Hitler are stark and dis­turb­ing.

Bhai Am­rik Singh, Chair­per­son of the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion UK con­tends that the logic of non-in­ter­fer­ence in in­ter­nal af­fairs, used by In­dian regimes past and pre­sent, can­not be a shield for hu­man rights abuses.

The Fed­er­a­tion’s role in po­lit­i­cal ad­vo­cacy, its as­so­ci­a­tions with par­lia­men­tary groups and hu­man rights bod­ies, and its cam­paigns against in­jus­tice un­der­score the Sikh com­mu­ni­ty’s com­mit­ment to be­ing cham­pi­ons of hu­man rights. Their role tran­scends the in­jus­tices to the Sikhs and takes note of the hu­man­i­tar­ian cause of the res­i­dents of Gaza as well.

As the world re­flects on the 75th an­niver­sary of a land­mark hu­man rights doc­u­ment -the Uni­ver­sal De­c­la­ra­tion of Hu­man Rights, the Sikh Fed­er­a­tion says, “The Sikh com­mu­nity, guided by the time­less teach­ings of their founder, will con­tinue to be at the fore­front of this global strug­gle for dig­nity, free­dom, and jus­tice.”