Littérateurs of the Punjabi Language Editorial
From the Baani of the Sikh Gurus to the Qalaam of Baba Fareed Ganjshakar, Baba Bulleh Shah, Hazrat Shah Hussein and Sultan Bahu, Punjab has provided the backdrop for an endless list of mystic prose that epitomizes love for all humanity, the One-ness of God, and the importance of remembering the Creator.
Atul's Quest By Nader Habibi
It is well known that there is a strong admiration for light skin complexion in many developing countries. This tendency is most visible in South Asia where young people, (both men and women) express a preference for marriage partners with light skin color. Atul's Quest is a satirical story about what happens when this admiration for whiteness is taken to an extreme.
Interview With Gulbuddin Hekmatyar By Mohammad Shehzad
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the founding chief of Hizb-e-Islami, is the Federal Bureau of Investigation's most wanted Afghan warlord who carries $25 million on his head. He used to be the Central Intelligence Agency's blue-eyed boy during the United States' proxy war against the Soviet Union in the 1970s and 1980s.
Punjab River Waters Issue By Balbir Singh Sooch
The Constitution of India has given the power to every State to legislate, and the function of the courts is to interpret the same. Moreover river water is a State subject. The state of Punjab has the right to defend its citizens by all means.
Letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh By Daljit Singh
We congratulate you for achieving a new pinnacle in your already distinguished career. With immense optimism we welcome the news of your appointment as Prime Minister of India. We are sanguine foremost because of your competence and integrity, and only secondarily because you are a Sikh. With your remarkable appointment as the Prime Minister of India, we are hopeful that India will be more faithful to the rule of law.
Civic, Democratic Islam: America’s Desperate Search for the ‘Liberal’ Muslim By Yoginder Sikand
An illustration of the actual agenda behind the sort of ‘liberal Islam’ that America is now so feverishly seeking to promote is provided by a recent report prepared by the RAND Corporation, a conservative American think-tank. Titled Civil Democratic Islam: Partners, Resources and Strategies, the report is authored by a certain Cheryl Benard, Director of Research at the Boltzmann Institute in Austria.
On Apology and Courage By Jasbir Singh Sethi
Take the case of Sultana Begum. Did Sikhs ask for her to apologize? Not that I know of. She was not the person who perpetrated atrocities against Sikhs. She had nothing to gain by apologizing. She was not standing for public office.
Why Did We Fast? By Angana Chatterji
Traditional subsistence cultures are seen as inadequately 'productive' and socially anachronistic, as a diversity of cultures named indigenous share the ongoing reality of cultural and physical genocide. International institutions and national governments polarize the debate, as they claim to represent the nation and its best interest, and assert that the resisting disenfranchised are anti-nation, anti-development, anti-technology.
Eurocentric Foundations of Feminist Concepts and the Challenge of African Epistemologies By Oyeronke Oyewumi
The difficulty of applying feminist concepts to express and analyze African realities is the central challenge of African gender studies. The fact that western gender categories are presented as inherent in nature (of bodies) and operate on a dichotomous, binarily opposed male/female, man/woman duality in which the male is assumed to be superior and therefore the defining category, is particularly alien to many African cultures.
Impact of Shari’ah Laws on Minorities in Pakistan By Naeem Shakir
Non-Muslims were not treated as part of one Pakistan nation as according to Islamists there were two nations in the country, one Muslim and the other non-Muslim. The Jamiat-e- Islami wrote a lot of literature about the status of a non-Muslim in an Islamic State. This generated the baneful sentiment of religious prejudice, which slowly marginalised the non-Muslim citizens in the socio-political life.
Sikhism and History: A Review Ishwinder Singh
Two previous compilations of papers presented at earlier conferences in the same university have been published by Manohar Publishers. The current volume is prepared in honour of Prof W.H.McLeod and includes contributions by Pashaura Singh, N. Gerald Barrier, Nikki-Guninder Kaur Singh, Louis E. Fenech, Robin Rinehart, Tony Ballantyne, Doris Jakobsh, Arthur Helweg and Darshan S. Tatla.
Interview with Colonel G.B. Singh Manbir Singh Chowdhary
Colonel G.B. Singh, holds the distinction of being one of the few high ranking Sikh officers in the U.S. Military. He comes across as a man that stands defiant of the odds against him, and unafraid to speak out against commonly accepted thought and practice.
Filipino-American wins Pulitzer By Danny Chan
Cheryl Diaz Meyer, a senior staff photographer with the Dallas Morning News, received journalism’s highest US honor for a picture taken while accompanying US forces in Iraq last year.
Doris R. Jakobsh: A Self-Appointed Expert By J.S. Mann and S.S. Sodhi
Her motivation appear to be repression-projection mechanism. It means whatever she has been made to repress, as a female growing up in North America, she wants to displace and project to Sikh ethos. She claims that it will help her in reducing contradictions in her otherwise ‘meaningless’ life!
Guru Purnima By Swami Chidanand Saraswati
Vyasji is heralded as the one who classified and arranged the four Vedas, and as the author of the 18 Puranas, the Mahabharata and the Bhagavad Gita. Having brought such an immeasurable treasure chest of wisdom to the world, Vyasji is worshipped as the great Guru.
Meditation: The Final Freedom By Sukhvir Singh
Our minds are conditioned, and we find it extremely difficult to experience beyond this conditioning. Those who can go beyond the mind or beyond their past experiences are called enlightened people.
Father Cedric Prakash: Providing Relief to Victims By Yoginder Sikand
Inter-faith dialogue must cease to be an elitist preoccupation, the sole preserve of priests and theologians. Lay people need to formulate, against the quarrelsome claims of the clergy, progressive understandings of their own religions and work to make the secular space sacred.
After all, the Kingdom of God belongs to all, not just to professional priests.
Guru Nanak in Ceylon? By M.S. Ahluwalia
Fortunately, however, the recent researches on this issue show that whatever meager information is contained in the manuscript is basically true. Since there is a definite mention of the Guru’s visit to Sri Lanka in various traditional sources, it will not be futile attempt to study the whole issue from the point of view of history.
Assassination of Chet Singh Bajwa By Harbans Singh Noor
In case of Maharaja Ranjit Singh's empire, the process was hastened by sycophants and scheming Dogra brothers -- Gulab Singh, Dhian Singh and Suchet Singh -- whom Maharaja had reared and placed at vantage points. And, above all, the 'octopus' known as the East India Company lying just south of the Sutlej river, had already planted its tentacles in the Maharaja's kingdom, waiting to swallow it.
Gandhi: Behind the Mask of Divinity By Baldev Singh
Gandhi’s satyagrah was for better treatment of Indians in South Africa who, according to Gandhi, were treated the same way as savage kaffirs (native Black people). In his stay of twenty years in South Africa, Gandhi had no social contacts with the kaffirs, as he did not see any common ground with them in the daily affairs of life. He was horrified when he was lodged with “natives” in the same prison. He disliked wearing clothes with “N” (natives) printed on it.
Prisoner Estrada Continues to Pull Election Strings Danny Chan
Despite his incarceration since 2001 on plunder charges, Joseph Estrada continues to cast a pall on the presidential elections. The deposed former president has been imprisoned since his ouster at the people power uprising in Manila and the installation of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, then the vice president, into the country’s presidency.
Gurbani’s Correct Interpretation: A Rejoinder By Baldev Singh
Joginder Singh, a retired principal from Chandigarh, in his article Gurbani’s Correct Interpretation published in the Abstacts of Sikh Studies, has accused Gurbakhs Singh Kala Afghana and I of damaging Sikhism. This short article is poorly written out of anger, and it is full of errors and misinterpretations.
Tribute To My Brother: Sardar Nirmal Singh Thind Bhupinder Singh Holland
On November 11, 1987 he was arrested by the central reserve police (CRP) after a raid at his house in Amritsar two days before his marriage to Rajwinder Kaur, the daughter of a well-respected and prominent farmer of Lohara Partapappura village on the Jalandhar Nakodhar road.
Stop Abuse of Children: Need For Education Reform Baljinder Kaur
Different organizations working from India and abroad are very concerned on growing abuses of innocent children in schools under the name of education and examinations. We condemn it and ask parents, teachers and the school administration to review their behavior toward children.
Remembering Operation Bluestar By S.S. Dhanoa
I am convinced that Mrs. Gandhi was sympathetic towards the Sikhs but she would not allow the Akalis to get political mileage from the ‘morcha launched by the Akalis. She tried mediation through Harkishen Singh Surjit, late Sardar Swaran Singh, Raghunandan Lal Bhatia and many others to get the matter resolved.
Who is a Punjabi? By Baldev Singh
Later that year when the Queen of England visited India, she expressed her desire to pay homage at Darbar Sahib (Golden Temple) and the Jallianwala Bagh Memorial. But Gujral tried his best to persuade her to cancel the visit. Jallianwalla Bagh Memorial was built in honor of all Punjabis who were massacred by Genral Dyer on the day of Baisakhi, April 13, 1919.
Islam and the Challenge of Democracy By Yoginder Sikand
The relationship between Islam and democracy is a much discussed and hotly debated issue. Given the diverse understandings of democracy and Islam, the answer to the question of the compatibility between the two is not a straightforward one. As Khaled Abou El Fadl makes clear in his absorbing book Islam and the Challenge of Democracy, Islam and democracy are not singularly defined concepts, and the quest for reconciling the two must necessarily entail exploring the plurality of understandings of both.
The Truth About the Indian Mutiny of 1857 By Ganda Singh
With the sepoys not having the overthrow of the East India Company's rule as their objective, nor any concerted plan of campaign, and their leaders being positively selfish and treacherous, playing a double game, it is a cruel misinterpretation of history to call it a war of Indian Independence. And it would be the height of injustice to accuse for its failure those who happened not to join this aimless, planless, and leaderless uprising.
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