The un­of­fi­cial am­bas­sador of the Sikhs -Har­jin­der Singh Kukreja, dur­ing a hol­i­day in Thai­land, par­tic­i­pates in the Thai Sikh Lan­gar Sewa for the home­less and needy in Bangkok and brings out tales of Thai Sikhs which will make us proud. 

The Thai Sikh Lan­gar is a story of shar­ing by Sikhs in Thai­land draw­ing upon the Sikh tra­di­tion of Free Com­mu­nity Kitchen -the Lan­gar. It is the tale of the un­mit­i­gated love and re­spect by Thai Sikhs for the erst­while King of Siam -His Majesty King Bhu­mi­bol Adulyadej of Thai­land (King Rama IX of the Chakri dy­nasty), who was a source of in­spi­ra­tion and had im­mense kind­ness and love for all his sub­jects.

I have al­ways loved Thai­land and the Sikh pres­ence there. My ma­jor in­ter­ac­tions with Thai Sikhs hap­pened through­out my school­ing in Hamp­ton Court, Mus­soorie un­til I com­pleted high school from St. George’s, Mus­soorie.

The cur­rent visit, though per­sonal turned out to be an in­ter­ac­tion with the who’s who of Thai­land and their im­mense con­tri­bu­tion to the in­dus­try, com­merce and so­cial ser­vice. It is a treat to lis­ten to Sikhs speak­ing flaw­less Thai, per­haps some sound­ing even bet­ter than the Thais them­selves, clearly show­ing the to­tal in­te­gra­tion of Sikhs into Thai so­ci­ety. A Sikh scholar Dil­dar Singh has even trans­lated Sukhmani Sahib into the Thai lan­guage.

It was heart-warm­ing to see close to a thou­sand home­less and needy peo­ple line up every Wednes­day out­side the Hualam­phong -one of the main rail­way sta­tions in Thai­land, wait­ing for young Sikh vol­un­teers to serve a proper Thai meal as part of their weekly Thai Lan­gar Sewa, some­thing which they have been do­ing with clock­wise pre­ci­sion for the last two years. 

When I par­tic­i­pated in the Lan­gar with my son, it was a Sikh home­com­ing, as do­ing the Lan­gar Sewa whether in a mosque in Lud­hi­ana or pro­vid­ing a whole­some meal to Sik­li­gar Sikhs in my restau­rant, has al­ways been given me great joy. This is one as­pect of the prac­ti­cal side of the Sikh way of life, which Sikhs en­joy as it gives us bless­ings and a chance to do hu­man­i­tar­ian work. 

“It was heart-warm­ing to see close to a thou­sand home­less and needy peo­ple line up every Wednes­day out­side the Hualam­phong -one of the main rail­way sta­tions in Thai­land, wait­ing for young Sikh vol­un­teers to serve a proper Thai meal as part of their weekly Thai Lan­gar Sewa, some­thing which they have been do­ing with clock­wise pre­ci­sion for the last two years”

My son -Rehras Singh and I were thrilled to par­tic­i­pate in the Thai Lan­gar Sewa. It was so soul-sat­is­fy­ing to see hap­pi­ness in the eyes of the el­derly when they par­took Lan­gar. I have al­ways won­dered as to why this world is so un­equal, “why the world com­mu­nity, with all its progress, can­not guar­an­tee a roof over the head and a sim­ple whole­some meal to all world cit­i­zens.” It is quite dis­turb­ing to see home­less peo­ple in de­vel­op­ing and de­vel­oped coun­tries too. Some­thing is wrong with the dis­tri­b­u­tion and shar­ing sys­tems in de­vel­op­ing as well as de­vel­oped coun­tries. I am thank­ful to my Gu­rus for giv­ing us the tra­di­tion of Lan­gar.

Pawan Singh told me that, “As such serv­ing rice on the streets is not al­lowed in Thai­land but be­cause of the rep­u­ta­tion of the Sikhs, there is no ob­jec­tion. Mr Pavin is re­ally help­ful and co­op­er­a­tive as go­ing into rail­way sta­tions is not easy.”

“The Sikh tra­di­tion is that when they start Lan­gar, they make an an­nounce­ment that “Lan­gar is ready. Please do come and par­take it.” I was de­lighted to see the se­nior-most of­fi­cial at the Bangkok rail­way sta­tion Mr Pavin mak­ing such an an­nounce­ment in the Thai lan­guage, prais­ing the Sikhs and urg­ing those who were eat­ing to be grate­ful God and the Sikhs.”

The Sikh tra­di­tion is that when they start Lan­gar, they make an an­nounce­ment that “Lan­gar is ready. Please do come and par­take it.” I was de­lighted to see the se­nior-most of­fi­cial at the Bangkok rail­way sta­tion Mr Pavin mak­ing such an an­nounce­ment in the Thai lan­guage, prais­ing the Sikhs and urg­ing those who were eat­ing to be grate­ful God and the Sikhs. 

Pi­o­neered by Aw­tar Singh Sachdev and Rinku Singh Chhabra, the weekly Thai Lan­gar move­ment gained mo­men­tum af­ter young Thai Sikh vol­un­teers led by Pawan Singh have taken it to a new level. Of the many vol­un­teers, I saw Pawan Singh, Amorn­jit Singh, Aviruth Singh, Varin Singh, Dusit Singh, Jaswinder Singh and Av­tar Singh.

In­ter­est­ingly, to spread aware­ness about the Sikh re­li­gion, the young Sikhs have de­vel­oped a Thai Sikh wa­ter bot­tle which is dis­trib­uted along with the food. With sup­port from Sikhs from across Thai­land, the Thai Lan­gar Sewa in Bangkok will grow to reach out to more needy peo­ple. So, next time you are in Thai­land and there is a Wednes­day in your itin­er­ary, join the Thai Sikh Lan­gar Sewa at the Bangkok rail­way sta­tion and share hap­pi­ness and joy.

An­other sig­nif­i­cant Lan­gar Sewa is be­ing done by this group of the Thai Sikhs, wherein since the last 10 years, they have been pro­vid­ing food to im­mi­grants who have been stuck in Thai­land wait­ing to be sent back for want of proper doc­u­men­ta­tion.  

This is not all. In a trib­ute to the for­mer King, the Sikh com­mu­nity in Thai­land has com­mit­ted to con­struct 72 school build­ings in rural Thai­land, out of which 29 build­ings have al­ready been com­pleted and handed over to the au­thor­i­ties with each build­ing to bear the nomen­cla­ture, “With the Bless­ings of Guru Nanak”. Her Royal High­ness Princess Maha Chakri Sirind­horn presided over the cer­e­mony when the lat­est build­ing in Sakorn Nakorn was in­au­gu­rated. The school build­ing pro­ject sees the con­tri­bu­tion and par­tic­i­pa­tion of lead­ing Sikh per­son­al­i­ties like Mo­hin­der Singh Ku­mar, Dar­shan Singh Sachdev and Pin­der­pal Singh Madan and oth­ers. 

My jour­ney into the hearts and homes of Thai Sikhs con­tin­ues.