:dateline:Following successful�Vaisakhi celebrations in the streets of Birmingham, which included�a Nagar Kirtan and fair�in a local park, a local paper published an article linking the celebrations with a right wing Sikh organization based in India. �A picture showing fabric�printed with a symbol of a AK-47 gun and the words “Khalistan Zindabad,” have been wrongly linked by the news outlet to a Sikh organisation fighting for an independent state. �The banner was put up on a canopy that was selling t-shirts and other merchandise.During a radio talk show on BBC WM 95.6 this morning, Khalid Mahmood said, �Khalistan Zindabad, as many people know, is a prescribed organisation in the European Union and the UK and therefore displaying that at a family event, and displaying those weapons openly at a family event, I think contravenes basic decency that we have.”
�If the organisers didn�t know about it, they should have been warned properly about it and certainly they should take action in the future to ensure this does not carry on.�
Furthermore Mr. Mahmood was at the fair�and yet he never asked any of the people who were wearing the T-Shirts or waving the flags as to what they were supporting. Sikh organisations have said: “We demand that he retract his argument and issue a full apology for maligning the Sikh freedom movement on Radio, Press and TV.”Davinder Singh from the Sikh Federation said the wording actually meant, �Long live an independent Sikh state,� and supported revolution rather than�any particular organization.��If you had a banner with the words ‘Irish republic’ it wouldn�t mean IRA. That is what we said, ‘Khalistan Zindabad’, the two words alone have got nothing to do with the banned organisation,� he said. “The assault rifle has very much become a symbol of revolution. There is a Paris collective called Defend Paris with exactly the same images.�The flags of Zimbabwe, Mosambique and East Timor have the AK47 on the flags.”
