Columnists
The Lady Doth Protest Too Much, Methinks
DAILY FIX
Saturday, August 11, 2012
While Americans of every background have joined their Sikh counterparts in silent prayer this week, India and its politicians have been loudly beating their breasts and wailing at the top of their voices.
They say they are upset over the deaths of six Sikh-Americans at the hands of the hate-filled gunman in Wisconsin on August 5.
I don’t understand.
India is upset? Its politicians are upset? Its people are upset?
Why?
Why suddenly this concern over the welfare of Sikhs, pray?
True, four of the dead held Indian passports still. But remember, they had LEFT India, not just to visit America but to make it their home. If that doesn’t give you the message, let me put it in simple words: they had turned their back on your sad land and had voluntarily, willingly, gladly, gratefully, found a new home.
Please, please, do not insult their memory by referring to them as Indians any more. Not even ‘Indian-Americans’.
They died as proud “Sikh-Americans”, grateful to God for their deliverance from the callous and corrupt land they had fled.
If there was a smidgen of sincerity in your full-throated expressions of sorrow, if you had even the least degree of decency, if you had even the slightest ability to discern right from wrong, you would remember the atrocities you have committed against your own Sikh population, against your Muslims, against your Christians, against your women and children, against your poor, and continue to do it to this very day … and you would instantly self-incinerate in spontaneous combustion, in the self-shame that would engulf you.
India? You have betrayed your only nation-builders, the elite of your land, the crème de la crème of your society, until they have lined up desperately on your shores to catch the first boat out.
And you look across at us from your perches, drooling in envy, and console yourself with false assurances that we are unhappy in our new homes.
We are not, trust me.
Actually, compared to what we have left behind, we are in heaven. We thank God every morning and every night for the gift of escape from your God-forssaken land.
You seem to resent that we have survived 1984, but fail to see that you haven’t.
India’s politicians and bureaucrats? You have no credibility in the rest of the world. No matter what you say, the lies and half-truths about us, or the crocodile tears you shed over the challenges we face, the world knows that you do not mean a single word, a single tear-drop.
Ask any decent journalist, intellectual, politician, bureaucrat, anyone in the West, and they’ll tell you in confidence that they know exactly what you are, and ascribe as much weight to your words and pretensions as you do to integrity and honesty.
India’s majority? I’m afraid you are as guilty of India’s crimes as the worst among you. At best, your crimes are those of omission, and they are no better, no less culpable, than the mass murderers you have aided and abetted, encouraged and condoned, hidden and sheltered, or merely looked away in wanton disregard or convenience.
America? Canada? Britain? Australia? New Zealand?
These and all other nations like them are decent, humane societies. True, they are less than perfect and bad things happen here as well.
I know it is difficult for you to understand, so numb you have become to independent thought, that the charm of civilized behaviour is not that it guarantees you that no bad thing will happen, but that if and when it does, remedies will be brought into gear instantly to rectify the wrong and harm, and to prevent a recurrence.
THAT, more than anything else, sets America and all of these good societies apart from the hell-hole that you have created for yourselves and your people.
We are not impressed by your public protestations, your flag-burnings, your hoarse speeches and missives and notes to the governments of the West.
No one is. No one has been fooled.
We know that no Sikh in his right mind would behave the way you do. Look for yourself: see how Sikhs in North America have behaved at a time of extreme distress and you’ll see - if your eyes are indeed open - what Sikhs and Sikhi is all about. Not the caricature you falsely create in your streets as photo-ops.
I know you don’t understand. You simply can’t fathom why Sikh-Americans feel more American than ever before.
It‘s despite the fact that we have lost six of our loved ones at the hands of a madman … it's simply because of the way all of America has stepped up and stood with us, shoulder to shoulder. We mourn our loss but, in the same breath, we thank the Good Lord for all His blessings.
So, please go away and leave us alone … which was our intention in the first place when we fled your shores.
Conversation about this article
1: G.C. Singh (USA), August 11, 2012, 7:14 AM.
The unprecedented love and support that Sikh-Americans have received because of this tragedy in Wisconsin has unnerved the Indian Government and its "intelligence" agencies who have spent the better part of the last three decades in defaming Sikhs as terrorist, fundamentalists, and separatists, etc. Their first reaction was to bring hired goons (barrey de tattu) of professional protesters led by Paramjeet Pamma to the American Embassy in New Delhi. The photographs of the burning of the American flag and waving of unsheathed swords by these goons in turbans were sent promptly throughout the world by Indian news agencies. Most of the Indian embassies and missions around the world, especially in the West are staffed by "intelligence' goons who routinely carry out infiltration and destabilizing activities in the Sikh communities and gurdwaras. I would not be surprised if some where in RAW headquarters in New Delhi today, they're planning a major violent confrontation in some Sikh setting in the diaspora, to counter what they perceive as a major setback to their propaganda and hate campaign against Sikhs. Therefore I urge all Sikh gurdwaras and individuals to be on the look out for mischief-mongers - many of them in Sikh garbs who will try to pick a fight or create strife and violence.
2: Baldev Singh (Bradford, United Kingdom), August 11, 2012, 7:44 AM.
To think that Sikhs gave their all to India to help get its freedom, first from the Moguls and then the British ... and this mischief from India in return!
3: Sunny Grewal (Abbotsford, British Columbia, Canada), August 11, 2012, 11:29 AM.
Many Indians have gone out of their way to not only use this incident to shed crocodile tears but also to portray the Sikh community negatively. Any veteran of the internet would know that the comments sections of news sites are a cesspool of trolls, arm chair elitists and tiny bigoted communities which congregate together to make their views appear more mainstream than they actually are. Regardless, I have noticed that many Hindus have been commenting, bringing up the same issues: assassination of Indira Gandhi (btw, when this is presented, it's always emphasized that she was the first female prime minister, just to show us as women killers) and the Air India bombing ("See, they wear turbans and they blow up planes, they are terrorists!") The jealousy which Indians harbor towards Sikhs is truly astounding.
4: Charandeep Singh (Chandigarh, Punjab), August 14, 2012, 10:40 PM.
I totally agree with Sunny Singh. They are out to make Sikhs look like anti-women. We have to take our teachings to the world in general and women in particular. When it was being said by the Hindus - "dhol, gawar, shudar, pashu, nari, yeh sabh taadan ke adhikari" - literally, "A drum, an illitrate, a low caste, an animal and a woman, all deserve beatings." This line was said by a person whom Hindus call a saint. The birth of Sikhi itself has been on the foundations of gender equality. In the 18th century, when the looter Abdali was taking away 22000 young women as slaves to sell in the harems of Central Asia, great Sikhs fought guerilla warfare to rescue and bring them back. But see the irony, when these girls were taken back to their homes, the relatives refused to take them back - saying "khandit ho gayee hai" - "she has been made impure!". The same treatment was given to Sita in the Ramayan story. In sikh teachings, women are a given high regard. I think awareness has to be created.