Rajasthan University Bans Sikh Student From Taking Exam

AMRITSAR, Punjab—The Shiromani Gurdwara Prabhandak Committee (SGPC) has strongly criticized Ganganagar (Rajasthan) based “University of Kota” also called “Kota University” for banning an Amritdhari Sikh student from entering the examination hall because of his Kirpan.

He said that many foreign countries have allowed Sikhs to wear Kirpans but it was unfortunate that Sikhs were being treated as “slaves” in India. In a statement SGPC president Avtar Singh Makkar said ” The Kirpan, is one of the essential articles of faith that a Sikh must wear at all times, but the administration of Kota University did not allow an Amritdhari Sikh to enter the examination hall because he was wearing a kirpan.”  Jaswinder Singh was to take part in the examination for the course of “Registered Medical Practitioner” (RMP).

“Kota University’s move has hurt the sentiments of the global Sikh community”, SGPC statement reads.

Avtar Singh Makkar said that Kota University administration should withdraw it’s “Aurangzeb-style” order and allow Sikh students to take part in the examination. He said that special arrangement should be made for Jagwinder Singh so that he could take part in exam that he missed because of the university’s wrongful restrain. He said that if the university administration fails to act as per SGPC’s demands, legal action shall be fired against them.

2 COMMENTS

  1. Here is some history of life of Hindus under Mughal rule and now these Hindus are acting like the Mughals themselves. This was taken from a Hindu website so I know it is not biased. My question is; What do you call someone who doesn’t know, has forgotten or doesn’t care about learning their history, background?

    The Hindu-Muslim Conflict was Economic, Social, Cultural, Military and Religious
    The fierce conflict, that featured the early days of the Muslim occupation of India, was in its hidden essence a conflict for domination of which religion was only one aspect. This struggle was primarily between the Muslim nobility (Amirs) led by the Muslim Monarch (Sultan) on one side with the Hindu nobility and general Hindu population on the other.

    To quote D.D. Kosambi , a contemporary historian The monarch’s regulations were so strictly carried out that the Khuts, Mukaddims or Chaudhuris (Hindu noblemen and village headmen) were not able to ride on horse-back. They were not allowed to carry weapons or even to indulge in betel. These classes were brought to such a state of obedience that one revenue officer would string twenty Khuts, Mukaddims or Chaudhuris together by the neck and enforce payment by blows. [2]

    The Lower Castes (Classes) Bore the Worst Burden
    The tactics of the Muslim monarchy were aimed at breaking the hold of the erstwhile Hindu feudal nobility on the society and the economy. At its core, the Hindu-Muslim struggle was a brutal effort of a new ruling class of the Muslim conquerors in expropriating an older and established ruling class of its accumulated surplus along with the right to appropriate in the future.

    The exploited classes of the former Hindu social structure did not experience any change in their economic position, but they now bore the additional burden of repression on religious grounds, the payment of Jazia (penal tax which the Hindus had to pay for refusing to convert to Islam) and waves of forced conversions. They, like their more fortunate noblemen and upper caste fellow countrymen, were made to submit to ‘Islam’ at the point of the Sword along with the arbitrary humiliation of the honor of their womenfolk, and destruction of their places of worship, in addition to the discrimination in legal matters and a general status of being second class citizens. It was for these tyrannical policies that the Muslims were looked upon by all Indians as Mlechha which in Sanskrit means “barbarian”. But despite Muslim tyranny, the lower castes of the Vaishyas and Shudras continued to be tillers of the land with an obligation to part with a share of the crop to the state – whether Hindu or Muslim. Under Muslim rule their economic position did not change, but their social position became worse.

    Brief Revival of Slavery under Muslim Rule
    The brief revival of slavery that took place under the Delhi Sultanate was in no way comparable to the institution which existed in the ancient Greco-Roman world. The Mohammedan rulers enslaved the subjugated native population in the form of domestic servants at their palaces. This institution of domestic slavery did not represent a productive organization as it was in the world of antiquity. During the Sultanate, whenever the slaves under the Mohammedan feudal chieftain became too numerous, the heads of these favored servants were cut off without mercy and were made into heaps in front of the darbar (court)[3].

    The setting sun casts its glow on the Orchha temples across the river that flows past the complex. In the dark days of Muslim Rule the Bundela rulers not only tried to preserve their independence but also preserve a hoary tradition of temple building in an age when the Muslim aggressors spared no opportunity to vandalize any non-Muslim structure that could lay their hand on.This showed the low importance given to both human life and to the practice of slavery in the productive process. Had slavery occupied an important place in day-to-day production, such a massacre without impunity could never have taken place. Apart from the low importance attached to slavery, the massacres also reflect the ruthless mentality of the Sultans of Delhi.

    Dynasties set up by the Muslim Aggressors in India from 1194 C.E. up to 1857 C.E.
    After Mahumd Ghori’s victory over Prithiviraj in 1192 and over Jaichandra in 1194, he left his Governor Kutub-ud-din Aibak to rule the conquered territories. After Ghori’s death Kutub-ud-din set up an independent kingdom in 1206 and his dynasty is called the Slave Dynasty – after the background of Kutub-ud-din as a slave of Mahmud Ghori. The Slave Dynasty was succeeded by the following Muslim Dynasties viz. the Sayyeds, the Khiljis, the Tughlaks and the Lodis. They ruled Delhi and UP from 1206 C.E. up to 1527 C.E. Ibrahim Lodi, the last ruler of the Lodi line was defeated and killed by Babar who invaded India in 1527.

    A Marble Chattri at Udaipur. Udaipur means City of the Rising Sun.The Moghul Badshahs
    Babar came from Ferghana in Central Asia and descended from Timur who had invaded Delhi a hundred years before Babar’s invasion. Babar established the Mughal dynasty which ruled from Delhi (and later from Agra) and gradually expanded their hold over almost the whole of India. They ruled from 1527 upto 1857. There was a brief interregnum in their rule when Sher Shah Suri defeated and drove out Babar’s son Humayun after the battle of Chausa. Humayun came back a few years later and defeated Sher Shah’s son to re-establish the Mughal line. But the Mughal heyday can be said to have ended in 1707 with the death of Aurangzeb. The period from 1740, after Nadir Shah’s (King of Persia) invasion and sack of Delhi, is dominated by the Marathas who held sway till 1803. The British replaced them as the informal overlords of the Mughals up to the abortive Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 when Mughal (and Muslim) rule was formally abolished by the British.

    But the fact to be noted here is that Sher Shah Suri who displaced Humayun for some years began a policy of rapprochement with the Hindu (Rajput) nobility. This policy was continued and improved upon by Emperor Akbar with positive results for the expansion of the Mughal Empire.

    Hidden from the covetous eyes of the Muslim iconoclasts, the temple at Bhimashankar in Maharashtra was constructed in thick forests deep in a valley during the middle ages.Rapproachment between the Rajput Nobility and the Moghal Rulers
    The policy of confrontation between the Mohammedan monarchy and the Hindu landed nobility did not last forever. The later Mughal rulers, realizing the long term losses from such a friction, were quick enough to befriend their class brethren from a different faith. The Akbar’s policy of conciliation towards the Rajput feudal clans and the appointment of Hindu Mansabdars, Subahdars and Jagirdars by the Deccan kingdoms were efforts towards a coordinated exploitation of the peasant masses.

    This policy was continued by the tyrant Aurangzeb especially for putting down revolts by the native princes. One instance is the appointment of Jai Singh Rajput, to lead the Mughal campaigns against Shivaji, which led to the treaty of Purandar between the Marathas and the Mughals.

    The Muslim rulers built on the same Feudal Base[4] of the Hindu Period
    The successful aggression of the Muslim invaders did not change the base of the earlier pre-Muslim society. The very first act of the Muslim invaders was to pillage the well endowed Hindu temples at Somnath, Thanesar, Mathura, Kannauj; and other places. By this, with one stroke, the riches concentrated in the hands of these temples through many centuries of grants from Hindu rulers, fell into the hands of the Muslim invaders from Ghazni and Ghori.

    Thus whether in the Sultanate of Delhi or in the Mughal rule, or in the petty Muslim Kingdoms of the Deccan, or in the Vijaynagar Empire or in that of the Marathas at a later stage, the feudal mode of production with its hierarchical apparatus remained unchanged. In place of the land grants like Bramhadeya Devadana and Aqrahara which existed during Hindu rule, we now had Inamdari, Jaqirdari, Subahdari, etc. The recipients of the land grants under the Delhi Sultans were initially only Muslims of Turkish and Persian extraction, Indian Muslim converts from the Hindu landed nobility and later in the time of the Mughals or even the Hindu Rajput noblemen.

    In spite of this compromise of the Hindu nobility with its Muslim counterpart, all through the Mohammedan rule an under-current of the state policy was the aim of converting people to Islam.

    How the Hindu Ruling Class – faced the Muslim Challenge in Various Ways
    The conflict of interests between the two ruling classes of the Hindu landed nobility and the Muslim monarchy was partly mitigated by the continuing opposition to the Muslim power, as happened in the case of the Rajputs especially in Mewad (the line of Rana Sanga and Maharana Pratap of Udaipur/Chittor).

    In the Gangetic valley, the Hindu landed nobility in most cases went over to the side of the Muslim Sultan, by getting themselves converted and thus retaining their position as the landed nobility along with the rights of revenue collection. The surnames Khatri, Chaudhary, Shah, Chohan, Patel, etc., still linger on in many Muslim families who were converts from the Hindu landed nobility. In Marwar (the house of the Suryavanshi Kachawahas of Amber/Jaipur), the erstwhile Hindu ruling families took the “honorable” course of giving away their daughters in marriage to the Muslim rulers of Delhi and thus saved their skin (and throne) all through the 700 years of Muslim rule.

    The Marathas in the south also followed another “honorable” compromise with the victorious Muslims by offering to be mercenaries under the service of the Muslim rulers (Shahji Bhosale for example). It was only when a national revival took place under the leadership and vision of Chattrapati Shivaji Maharaj that the Marathas came into their own.

  2. Is this the FIRST Shot under the Leadership of the New Prime Minister ship agaist SIKHS ?
    One wonder if the Management of the University have landed from Outer space. Have they forgotten the history of Indian Indepedent and the role played by the SIKHS ? and their sacrifices and SAHEEDES ?
    Why this is allowed ? Where are the good citizens of INDIA ?.
    It is time that the local Sikhs discard their Rose Coloured Glasses and wake up to the reality. THE SGPC is under wrong influence and leadership. One must fight what is Right and live in peace.

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