Altruistic Sikhs Come Out in Force – Worldwide

“Hello Langar! Goobye Hunger!”

Langar WeekLEEDS, UK—Sikhs have come out in droves this week, planting themselves in public areas across major cities around the globe, as part of a worldwide campaign focusing on the practice of serving free food (Langar).

The Langar Week campaign is currently underway in it’s second year running, as an initiative highlighting the Sikh practice of Langar – serving free food to any and all.

Cities such as New York, Toronto, Los Angeles, Kuala Lumpar, London, Mumbai and Glasgow, among many more, have seen members of the public being awe-struck at the Langar events taking place. And so too, in a little known town of Leeds in the UK, Sikhs have come together to share this altruistic practice in public.

In the early hours of Monday morning, the 5th of October, sevadars (selfless servants) are frying a mountain of samosas and preparing large pans of Chickpea curry at Sikh Gurdwaras around the Bradford/Leeds area. This is no special occasion, no festival or religious celebration -however, today is a day when the local Sikh come together to show the warm and friendly folk of Leeds a simple act of kindness, by serving them a free hot meal at Dortmund Square, situated in the heart of Leeds.

This unique event is part of an international initiative called Langar Week ( 5-11th October) where Sikh communities around the world were serving Langar to non Sikhs, be it by welcoming non-Sikhs to Gurdwara or taking Langar to the streets of heir town/cities. Some brave Sikhs served Langar in one of the most dangerous places on earth today – Syria!

The central goal of this initiative is to introduce the concept of Langar to a wider community to promote 3 main principles of Langar: Fighting Hunger, Equality and Compassion. It is also an opportunity to educate others about Sikhs and give a brief insight into this wonderfully rich faith.

Langar WeekThe Bradford/Leeds Langar team comprised of around 30 plus sevadars from the Bradford/Leeds area representing 8 local Gurdwaras. Each of the Gurdwaras played their part in preparing the food and it was delicious!  It was truly inspiring to see generations of Sikhs from various Gurdwaras around the region delivering this amazingly rewarding initiative.

The weather was abysmal -but given this is Yorkshire the howling wind and rain was not going to deter the dedicated and committed sevadars in delivering what they had set out to do after weeks of careful planning. So gazebos were erected, tables were laid and the hot food arrived just in time to serve our public. Sevadars were keen to engage in conversation with anyone that passed be it the everyday Leeds shopper, the young, old, all faiths and all colours sharing and eating the same food together – Equality in Action – Sikhi.

The local media took a very keen interest in the event, we had the team from Made in Leeds and BBC Radio Leeds covering the event, they too enjoyed the Langar.

Langar WeekWe are proud to say we managed to serve and talk to over 800 people in 1 hour and 20 minutes. Our team gave an overview of the principles behind Langar whilst the people of Leeds tucked into their Langar. Everyone made positive comments “Simply marvelous idea”. “Love the idea of eating together”, “Wonderful act of Kindness”, “You guys are Great” etc… The sevadars were humbled by the positive comments and the love they received from the people of Leeds – thank you Leeds for allowing us to serve you.

The team of sevadars would say this was a resounding success, great team work, good collaboration between 8 local Gurdwaras. Positive response from the local community and more importantly we all learned that our Guruji has given us a wonderful gem in Sikhi. This will inspire us to learn more about Sikhi and with Guruji’s help …practice being the kind of Sikhs that would make the  Almighty proud.

We can but strive everyday to be the best Sikhs we can be and excellent role models for the generations to follow.

2 COMMENTS

  1. nice to see a warming to the wider community, by all volunteers.. Well done. It reflects very much the principle teachings of Guru Nanak, of humanity being one. Hope to see more such initiatives reaching out to those in need, in the wider community.

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