Chandigarh, September 11, 2024 (Yes Punjab News)
The Kendri Singh Sabha – a central body of Singh Sabha Gurdwara has hailed Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for endorsing the Sikhs’ age-old assertion that they have an inalienable right to adhere to and protect their religious and cultural rights in free India.
The Sabha has supported Rahul Gandhi’s open declaration at an Indian gathering in the USA that India represented multiple ideas and rejected the RSS ideology of ‘oneness of Idea of India’ which has been the bedrock of the Hindutva ideology since the early 20th century.
Issuing a joint statement here today, Prof. Sham Singh (President), Senior journalists Jaspal Singh Sidhu, Gurpreet Singh (Global Sikh Council), Rajwinder Singh Rahi, Surinder Singh Kishanpura and Khushhal Singh, General Secretary Kendri Sri Guru Singh Sabha said, it is no longer a secret that the army attack on the Golden Temple in June 1984 and massacre of Sikhs in November 84 thereafter were triggered and perpetrated by the Hindutva politics which was openly practiced and followed by ruling Congress in league with RSS at that time.
Ironically, the fertile ground for Hindutva politics prepared by former Prime Minister India Gandhi and her Congress party had paved the way for the Modi regime and pro-Hindu Rashtra politics which pushed the Congress party itself to the margin for more than a decade.
Political thinkers associated to the Singh Sabha appreciate Rahul Gandhi, Leader of Opposition for assuming high moral ground – so far missing in Indian politics —which would certainly put halt to the ongoing BJP’s politics of hate, Hindu hegemony, communalization and targeting of minorities to the extent of lynching.
The Sikh leaders said the Congress leader rightly identified the malaise of Indian politics as caste-hierarchy and religion-cultural conflicts which invariably manifested in violence and mid-governance.
“Rahul Gandhi’s special mention to Sikhs’ freedom of wearing turban and their worship at Gurdwaras is the open recognition and support of the Sikhs’ distinct religious and cultural identity which the ruling Congress party had targeted 40 years ago,” they said.
Upholding Sikhs’ religious, cultural, and linguistic rights Rahul Gandhi, in a way openly rejected and criticized his grandmother Indira Gandhi’s policies towards Sikhs and Punjab in the 1980s. The Kendri Singh Sabha hoped that Rahul Gandhi’s politics would strengthen Indian federalism and enable the Sikhs to realize/ witness the spirit of the Anandpur Sahib Resolution becoming a reality in Indian politics.
The Kendri Singh Sabha said some Sikh leaders in league with the ruling BJP and Hindutva forces deliberately distorted Rahul Gandhi’s statement on Sikhs intending to keep the community stuck to the past and to prevent the Sikhs from reinventing/ reshaping their politics according to the changed reality of the present day India.
