Can Sikhs return to Baba Nanak in 550th year of his birth?

Jagtar Singh

This question might seem to be odd at the time when euphoria has been created among his followers all over the globe to celebrate 550^th anniversary of Guru Nanak, the founder of the revolutionary new socio-religious order that he revealed. Seminars are being held both in India and Pakistan, the land that is his place of birth from where the Sikhs were forced by fractured politics to migrate to what now is Indian Punjab, besides other countries where the Sikhs are settled in sizeable numbers.

The fact is that the Sikhs have deserted Guru Nanak by way of distancing from his new social order in practice.

In this 550^th year of his birth, the emphasis is not on his teachings by the ruling elite in Punjab but on hyperbolic celebrations characterised by pomp and show. The Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee that is perceived to be the custodian of the Sikh Faith and the Congress government in Punjab are  sparring over celebrations while competing to appropriate the anniversary. Baba Nanak might be feeling sad over these people.

Guru Nanak created the new order that is universal, humanistic and treats human being as human being without any distinction. His philosophy was based upon his experience during his long sojourns across the regions upto Mecca lasting about seventeen years during which he would interact with cross-sections of people. He was a Guru of the common people whom he preferred over money bags. And he was the man who earned his living and worked in his fields at Kartarpur Sahib that he founded and where he breathed his last. He introduced practiced social discipline to create a new world order whose foundation is egalitarianism and dignity of labour.

The Sikhs worship Guru Granth Sahib that contains his Bani with great reverence and that is all. They have stopped following what he preached. The religion that is theoretically casteless and classless is now as deeply caste-ridden and socially fractured as the Hindu society that Baba Nanak had completely rejected. His gurdwaras are now caste-based and this is amounts to total negation of the basics of Sikhism.

The 550^th anniversary celebrations should have been an occasion for introspection for his followers. Focus is missing in the celebrations that, like the 300^th anniversary of the birth of the Khalsa in 1999, are getting reduced to ritualism of taking out Nagar kirtans and organising seminars.

Can the Sikhs and their institutions resolve to spread his teachings across the globe in this year? But then they themselves would have to return to Guru Nanak first. Even a good primer in English on his teachings and Sikhism in a language comprehensible to an ordinary person is not available.

The first slogan should be to return to Guru Nanak in practice. This would be the biggest achievement for the community. Every religion in the world has faced such crisis at one time or the other. However, the Sikh order is more of practice than rituals. Now it is the rituals that dominate.

 What is all the more reprehensible is politicisation of the celebrations involving the Badal family controlled Akali Dal and the SGPC and Capt Amarinder Singh government.

It was on June 29 last that the SGPC and the Punjab government resolved to jointly organise the celebrations with Sultanpur Lodhi as the centre at a meeting chaired by Akal Takht acting Jathedar Giani Harpreet Singh in Amritsar.  As per the arrangement, both the SGPC and the state government were to invite the dignitaries jointly. However, the SGPC violated this understanding. The problem with the SGPC is that it is dictated by the family of Akali Dal patriarch and 5-time chief minister Parkash Singh Badal whose son Sukhbir Singh Badal is party president and daughter-in-law is union minister. SGPC president Gobind Singh Longowal is nothing more than a rubber stamp to carry out the instructions from above.

However, within hours of this meeting, Sukhbir, Harsimrat and Longowal were in Delhi to invite Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the main function.  The same leaders invited president of India Ram Nath Kovind on September 21.

SGPC is statutory body under Sikh Gurdwara Act, 1925 and as such, it is supposed to function independently. However, it is the Badal family that seems to have appropriated the celebrations thereby disregarding the decision taken at the joint meeting under Akal Takht chief.

One has to recall the tercentenary of the Khalsa in 1999 when Gurcharan Singh Tohra was the president of the SGPC but Parkash sing Badal planned it as is his show. Keeping in view the fractured situation towards the end of 1998 with differences having cropped up between Badal and Tohra, Akal Takht Jathedar Bhai Ranjit Singh issued directive on December 31 for jointly celebrating the tercentenary. It was for the first time that the birth of the Khalsa was to be celebrated at that mega scale.

Badal ignored the directive and both Bhai Ranjit Singh and Tohra were unceremoniously sacked. Badal appropriated the show. Tohra and Ranjit organised parallel celebrations at Anandpur Sahib and put up massive show. About 20 lakh Sikh devotees from across the globe visited Anandpur Sahib during week long celebrations.

However, the effort of Badal to capitalise this mega show were ultimately dashed. In the Lok Sabha election held in October 1999, the Akali Dal Badal could retain only one of the thirteen seats in the state. Not only the party was wiped out, even Sukhbir Singh Badal himself lost in Faridkot from where he had earlier won in 1996 and retained it in 1998. The Sikhs had reacted strongly to politicisation of the tercentenary.

The perception is now gaining ground that the Badal family is trying to whitewash the blot of sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib in 2015 by dominating the 550^th anniversary celebrations. But the issue has been etched deep on the Sikh sensitivity and the Badals have to live with it. Badal was the chief minister with Sukhbir as deputy chief minister at that time. The sacrilege at Bargari was perceived to be rooted in the electoral calculations of the Badal family in the context of support from the controversial Dera Sacha Sauda whose devotees were arrested after the exit of Badal government.

The perception got reinforced when Badal summoned Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Gurbahan Singh and his associates to his official residence to facilitate pardon for Dera Sacha chief Gurmit Ram Rahim Singh. This meeting of the Jathedars with Badal at his residence on this sensitive issue was in brazen violation of the Sikh maryada. Badal has still not given any explanation for summoning the jathedars to his residence. The Badals after having gone out of power staged what was seen as a drama by doing service at the Golden Temple by way of dusting of shoes of devotees and in Langar. However, this service was without specifying the reason. It is otherwise normal for people to dust shows at the Golden Temple and to sweep floors.

Let the celebrations be organised jointly by  the SGPC and the state government with the Akali leaders sitting with the Sangat, not on the stage with President and the Prime Minister.

Most important, however, is the return of the Sikhs to Baba Nanak. It should begin by shutting down caste based gurdwaras and cremation grounds. Both are in utter violation of the basic teachings of the Founder of the Faith.

The Sikh congregation at the main  function should be converted into general house of the Sikhs to pass formal resolution to this effect.

This would be the real celebrations of the 550^th anniversary.