by Manvir Singh

This paper was completed while conducting research on Sikhs in Britain at Oxford University. The essay discusses growing involvement of British Sikhs in domestic politics and covers their immigration patterns to the UK.

A Recipe for Political Conviction

Sikhs have thoroughly illustrated their magnetic predilection towards politics during their history.  Glancing back five centuries, to the roots of Sikhism, one can easily pick up on the elements that have led to the development of such a politically minded community.  Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh faith, was also the founder of Sikh political courage when he spoke up against the Mughal tyranny during his time (B Singh, 92).  This was a revolutionary especially because the strength and relentlessness of the Mughals all but silenced the political voice of the masses.  Successive Sikh gurus preserved Guru Nanak’s revolutionary spirit when they also attached themselves and the Sikh community to issues of political precedence. 

In fact, by the seventeenth century the synonymy of Sikhism and politicking for righteousness had become so clear that the sixth guru, Guru Hargobind, donned the dual swords of miri and piri – signifying every Sikh’s duty to maintain not only spiritual but also temporal responsibility.  Their political voice became further institutionalized once he built the Akal Takht, which even today is the Sikh high court for political affairs.  In the face of continuing religious persecution against non-Muslims, Guru Tegh Bahadur, the ninth guru, sacrificed his life in his quest to win the liberty to freely practice one’s respective faith (K Singh, 70n).  And the tenth guru, Guru Gobind Singh, was pivotal in making sure that this political fervor would not stagnate; in creating the Khalsa, he ensured this.

            Today, while the political issues of pertinence to Sikhs have undeniably changed, their attitude towards campaigning for righteousness has not.  While Sikhs are no doubt overrepresented in the Indian political arena, it is quite more interesting to view the community’s political involvement in the corners of the world where they have now settled.  The Anglo-Sikhs, the Diaspora in Britain, offer a particularly colorful illustration of the process of political participation in a “step-mother” country (Khera).  From the trickle of economic immigrants during the first half of the twentieth century through the development of the dual identity British-Sikh, this Diaspora has over time been involved politically to varying degrees and manners.  The extent of their participation has more-or-less been governed by patterns of immigration and settlement. 

Early immigrants, of course, were much less inclined to utilize the political machine unless their aim of earning a fair wage was compromised.  Later, as these early immigrants settled, integration begot the community’s political zeal.  And most recently, with second- and third-generation Anglo-Sikhs truly earning equal standing with their native British countrymen, the Diaspora has exercised formidable muscle in the political arena.  This paper will shine some light on precisely what changes have occurred during these periods as well as their primary causes and consequences.

Early Anglo-Sikhs Strapping Together

While mass immigration to Britain did not take place until the 1950, there were Punjabi-Sikh populations dotted around the main port cities beginning in the 1920s and1930s; it is speculated that many were formed by Sikh soldiers staying over after serving in Europe during the First World War (Ballard: 1989, 205-6; R Singh: 1986, 8).  Importantly, these Sikhs were most interested in what Britain had to offer them economically and only in staying for a short term.  These factors were crucial in the Anglo-Sikh community’s placement on the margins of British society during this period for two main reasons. 

One, in attempts to reap the full economic rewards of immigration – generally working six days per week to maximize one’s income – there was no spare time for social activity that would facilitate integration with the British (Helweg: 1979, 36).  Their migration was, after all, “above all an entrepreneurial activity” (Ballard: 1994, 9).  Two, because the early immigrants did not envision themselves staying long, there was little incentive to undertake effort and attempt to assimilate to a foreign land and its people.  Moreover, this would have been a challenge anyway, as there was a misperception that these new immigrants were stealing jobs from natives. 

Being the outsiders, however, perhaps was the primary impetus for increased cohesiveness amongst Anglo-Sikhs.  In 1938, the Indian Worker’s Association, IWA, was started in Coventry where there was most probably one of the largest pocket of Anglo-Sikhs (“Avtar…”; Tatla, 91).  Even though the roots of this organization were less political than they were social, it nevertheless offered a forum for exchange and strengthened intra-community cohesion.  During the years to follow, this cohesion would become increasingly important.

The 1950s saw “mass migration” of Sikhs to England (Ballard: 1989, 205).  They were restricted almost exclusively to manual labor, with most taking jobs in the manufacturing or the transportation sectors.  To a far greater extent than previous decades, this wave of Sikh immigrants was more prone to adopt Britain as their new home.  Roger Ballard, however, would likely substantiate this statement by adding here “the Britain about which they began to feel more comfortable was not an English Britain” (1989, 209).  This most definitely was the case, as their Britain – while now a viable place for permanent settlement – was one in which Sikhs were quite isolated.   In spite of this, the Anglo-Sikhs were taking strides towards conjoining themselves to their new country.  Demonstrations of their comfort in Britain come by way of an increasing involvement in the political sphere as well as a burgeoning trend towards purchasing rather than renting homes. 

Political activism was still centered on gaining entry to the workplace; the following case was the Anglo-Sikhs’ first trying political hurdle:

“ Manchester Sikh G. S. Sagar, a bus garage worker, applied for the post of conductor in 1959.  He was turned down as his turban violated the service rules … Sagar’s campaign, involving the local gurdwara and Manchester Sikhs, took seven years to reverse the decision.” (Tatla 100)

The importance of this hurdle does not lie only in clearing it – which, of course, is definitely consequential – but also in the community’s approach.  First, the preservation of the Sikh identity in the face of such foreign struggles demonstrates the resonance of the Sikh gurus’ age-old lessons.  Not only does this demonstrate the strong Sikh belief in religious freedom, but also that the community now had the numbers and, as a result, the seeds of confidence which fostered their ability to promote this liberty.  Second, in mobilizing the Manchester Sikhs as a community, the Sikhs were able to generate significant political clout.  It is notable that the Anglo-Sikh community, and not British workers’ rights groups, offered the primary political buttress to Sagar’s cause.  Of this unified nature, Bruce La Brack writes, “Punjabis realized their collective disabilities and disadvantages in the larger Anglo-dominated society.  It intensified their … tendency towards mutual aid among themselves” (378). 

The fact that these Anglo-Sikhs were not confident in the political justice system of Britain is reinforced in other situations as well.  In these situations again, it was the element of cohesion that granted them the results they required.  Arthur Helweg describes one particular illustration of this after some harassment to an Anglo-Sikh household:

“Within minutes of a telephone call, a car of Jat men drove up and patrolled the area searching for the English culprits.  The Sikhs maintained that they had to take the law into their own hands because the Police did nothing to protect them.” (1979, 79)

Although full confidence in Britain was not yet the case, Anglo-Sikhs did not dissent from their aim to become permanent fixtures of the citizenry.

While there has been no extensive study on the matter, there has been evidence to indicate an increase in Anglo-Sikh home ownership rather than rental beginning in the 1960s.  Additionally, Helweg reports that Sikhs would generally reside in the same neighborhoods during this time as a result of their communal tendencies (1979, 50).  Additionally, this scuttle towards home ownership also indicates a change from the very early immigrants; rather than sending all of their wealth back home to Punjab in the spirit of economic immigration, now Anglo-Sikhs were settling down and making Britain their new home.  The economic changes that had taken place in the community during its first few decades, paired with its cohesiveness, would instigate a political attitude in contrast to the general passivism of the years before the 1970s.

Generating a Nuanced Political Opinion

This community cohesiveness would only endure as long as the Anglo-Sikhs permitted it to.  While small fissures might have been apparent in some communities earlier, only during the 1970s did such divides become noticeable (Helweg: 1999, 358).  These splits had emerged mostly along economic lines.  Even though quite a few Sikhs had entered and remained in the labor force, a sizable chunk had instead opted for self-employment (Ballard: 1989, 213).  The recession and ensuing wave of unemployment during the 1970s benefited the self-employed and hurt those relying on wages from struggling British factories. 

One illustration of this comes by way of an Anglo-Sikh in Gravesend, Bhuta Singh, who “set up an employment service with British contractors to supply cheap Indian labour” (Helweg: 1979, 36).  Applying this example to the community as a whole, one notices how these intra-community rifts emerged.  Into the eighties, and with the continued “rise of a fairly prosperous business community,” the line between the blue- and white-collar Anglo-Sikhs became even more pronounced (P Singh, 631). 

Along with this, as Sikhs’ economic standing changed, so did their political stances and party affiliations.  For example, while Sikhs had historically been staunch supporters of the Labour party, more and more these same Sikhs found their own views meshing better with the pro-business Conservatives (Ibid.; R Singh: 1986, 29).  That these Sikhs were now confident enough to dissent from Labour – the traditional party of the Sikhs – shows two things: the complexion of the Anglo-Sikh community was undergoing change, and the politics of Britain were taking precedence over the community unity so prevalent in the earlier period.

These two inferences can be studied simultaneously, as they are interrelated.  Anglo-Sikhs had become much more familiar with British society as well as with its political machine.  While breaking from the previous strength-in-numbers scheme, these Sikhs were still campaigning for issues of pertinence to the Sikh community, but now were comfortable enough as citizens to trust the legislation to Westminster.  Even with the politico-economic divide amongst them, Anglo-Sikhs were many times pushing similar issues to their local member of parliament. 

For example, securing funding for Punjabi television and periodicals has been an important issue since the late 1970s, not least since watching television and reading the newspaper have been the most popular leisure activities in the community (R Singh: 1992, 10-1).  Since so many have been interested in obtaining this funding, Anglo-Sikhs in Bradford, for instance, have been able to “negotiate with the local council for their share in the Community Program funds” (R Singh: 1986, 29).  Whether or not this petition for funds involved the mobilization of most of Bradford’s Sikh citizenry or just a select few, the case remains that the vehicle engaged to do so was the British political one.  This is a stark difference from earlier years when, lacking the confidence, the Anglo-Sikh community might have instead simply raised the funds and quietly run Punjabi media channels.  So, although political and economic distinctions within the community did begin to emerge during the 1970s, this was a function only of the burgeoning confidence in an ability to break away from the whole and still actively politick for relevant issues.

Another political trend during this period was the swiftly growing strength of Punjabi nationalist parties in Britain (Tatla, 93).  In the gurdwaras, perhaps the main place of gathering for Anglo-Sikhs, it was commonplace for the political development between Punjab and New Delhi to be discussed, either formally in speeches or casually over conversation.  These nationalist sentiments felt by a large portion of the Anglo-Sikh community brought some variety into their political evolution in Britain. 

While the politics of prior had consisted mainly of employment legislation and upholding the Sikh identity, these interests demonstrated that although the Anglo-Sikhs were permanently settling in Britain they had not lost touch with their homeland.  This closeness to Punjab was felt by most Anglo-Sikhs, and was cause for the political groups centered on Punjabi issues to flourish in Britain.

As is noticeable from these examples, the Anglo-Sikh community’s attachment to politics ran the gamut of nuanced issues during these years; the most notable aspect of all this, however, is that – although political views differed to some extent – the community was making use of their rights as British citizens in employing Westminster’s help.  This confidence in Britain, and opposing insecurity in India, would be stratified further after Operation Bluestar in June of 1984.

Ramification: Mobilization

In the lens of this study, the most consequential aftereffect of 1984 was the detachment felt by Anglo-Sikhs towards India.  While the idea of creating a separate homeland for the Sikhs, Khalistan, was an idea that gelled well with the Diaspora all over the world, hindsight shows that this would in fact become a “lost cause” (“Indian…”).  However, no other political reason had embroiled Anglo-Sikhs in the political arena to the extent that 1984 did.  The anti-Indian sentiments, even though they had been brewing for quite some time, suddenly began to boil.  As an example, a gurdwara in Wolverhampton “shifted its account to a British bank” from its previous Indian one in response to the anti-Sikh violence espoused by the Indian government (Tatla, 138). 

Ajit Singh Khera characterizes this period as a movement from a spiritual persuasion to a political one.  Darshan Tatla adds, however, “various sections of the community [are] far from uniform” in their political stance on Khalistan (143).  Nevertheless, the response by British politicians to the pleas of Anglo-Sikhs demonstrated to the community as a whole the advantages of becoming more involved citizens.  After all, now that their allegiance to India was compromised, and the chances of Khalistan being provisioned was unlikely, the Anglo-Sikhs had no choice but to embrace Britain with both arms.

Both Labour and Conservative MPs, by the mid-1980s, represented a sizeable Sikh electorate.  And because Anglo-Sikhs were generally concentrated in certain electoral wards, it was impossible for these MPs to take no notice of the issues that were important to them.  As a result, with the help of a few select Anglo-Sikhs such as Iqbal Singh, who had already been politically involved, these MPs conducted debates in Parliament in regards to Operation Bluestar and the blatant human rights violations committed (I Singh; P Singh 631). 

Furthermore, international agencies such as Amnesty International and the United Nations Human Rights Commission were also engaged to assist with trudging through the cases of wrongdoings (I Singh).  At the same time, the Anglo-Sikh citizenry protested peacefully wherever in the country there lived a contingent (Ibid.).  Although there were a few exceptions to the peaceful element, by-and-large the Anglo-Sikhs used the norms and standards of British politics in their attempt to political justice in Punjab.  In organizing this political involvement and having a noticeable impact on the British politicians in Westminster, positive reinforcement would encourage the Anglo-Sikhs to continue to foster this political zeal.

Although Operation Bluestar dominated the Anglo-Sikh political agenda, there were a host of issues that were of importance in the British component of their lives as well.  In addition to campaigns for Punjabi media funding, an issue that had been garnering steam was the creation of Sikh schools.  This issue had been first proposed in 1971 in Gravesend, but had stagnated for some time (R Singh: 1992, 55).  Now, after being heartened by the legislative reception to the issue in Punjab, the political confidence to push such issues through was boosted.  While the Punjab issue consumed the Anglo-Sikh community, subsequent years show that even more important were the applicable political lessons it taught them.

Applying Newfound Political Clout More Broadly

In more recent years, the Anglo-Sikh community has continued to inspire political change through Westminster.  In 1997, for example, political pressure founded the Punjabis in Britain All-Party Parliamentary group; subsequently, Sikhs in Britain All-Party Parliamentary group was created (Khera; I Singh).  The creation of these groups indicates the notice being taken by British politicians of the community’s presence as a fixture of the British citizenry, as well as the need to formally integrate them into Westminster. 

Additionally, these groups would allow a forum for discussing issues of precedence in the community with Parliament as a whole – further advertising the Anglo-Sikhs.  John McDonnell, MP for Hayes and Harlington, has on several occasions raised the topic of the “Punjabi Community” in debates (McDonnell: 2000; McDonnell: 2001).  The topics that are discussed, it is interesting to note, include the visitor visa system, new Sikh schools, and cultural funding, to name a few (McDonnell: 2001).  Most of the issues discussed in these groups are of interest to the community at large; however, with the development of certain divides, there are many other issues affecting different parts of the Anglo-Sikh community that are hammered out on a piecemeal basis.

Although many of the community-wide issues continue to glue the community together, a host of non-cultural ones that permeate the lives of some Anglo-Sikhs but not others are usually glanced over.  These issues instead aid Anglo-Sikh integration with the British, albeit at the expense of perpetuating already-emerging class distinctions within the community.  One such issue came during a recent public meeting organized by the Oxford and Districts Trades Union Council; Sikhs and their non-Sikh counterparts came together to debate against anti-union legislature levied against workers at two large companies – Rolls Royce and Gate Gourmet.  The dynamic of the meeting itself and of its participants was very interesting to observe, not least because the representatives from the former company were white and those from the latter all Sikh. 

Many of Rolls Royce’s workers who were unfamiliar with the situation at Gate Gourmet offered to join the picket line with them; after all, the strife being felt was the same for both groups.  The picket line would be a political symbol of petition against anti-unionism – a picket of the British working class as a whole and not of white workers or of Sikh workers individually.  While cohesion along cultural issues will likely long be maintained, the Anglo-Sikh community now has the confidence to split and forge new ties with their British peers in politicking.

Some other interesting political issues have also recently emerged in the Anglo-Sikh community.  One of these was the community’s reaction to a play, Behzti (Dishonor).  There were several demonstrations against the sacrilegious lens through which the play depicted the Sikhs, and hundreds of rowdy protesters eventually caused the Birmingham Theater to cancel the play (“Theater…”).  Most interesting, however, is the fact that the community was quite divided on this issue.  Protesters did resort to some violence, and this would indicate the protesters were rather radical in their tact.  Nevertheless, their goal was accomplished.  Also interesting in this issue was the support offered to the Anglo-Sikhs by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Birmingham, who also encouraged potential patrons to boycott the play as it disrespected a place of worship (Ibid.).  With an increase in the community’s size, however, such differences in opinion will no doubt emerge; however, with support from their British countrymen, Anglo-Sikhs now rely less on the support of their own community.

Although splits in the community are increasingly evident, there is no cause for concern that Anglo-Sikhs will over time dissolve; enough issues will continue to furnish the unity that characterizes the community.  In 2003, for instance, the Sikh Federation (UK) was formed as Anglo-Sikhs’ “own political party” (Casciani).  Aims of this party are to make the Sikh political voice heard, especially in regards to education and religious rights (Ibid.).  Issues such as these will be pertinent to the community as a whole, and as a result will engage large contingents together. 

Further, many Anglo-Sikhs are still lobbying for justice in Punjab.  In fact, Anglo-Sikhs very recently reached out to Manmohan Singh, the current Indian prime minister, in an attempt to flex some additional muscle in British Parliament – essentially seeking that a fair portion of the annual economic aid sent to India should go to Punjab (F Singh).

With the most recent census showing that 40% of Sikhs in Britain are under the age of 24, there is much promise for continued political involvement in the future (Casciani).  That there are currently three Anglo-Sikh MPs shows the increasing involvement in the British political arena; and with the simultaneous creation of groups such as the British Organization for Sikh Students, BOSS, youth involvement in traditional Sikh politics is by no measure down (Thandi, 355).  Along with the increasing emphasis towards education and intellect rather than the focus on economic mobility during earlier generations, young Anglo-Sikhs are poised to develop the political capacity that has already been expanded by their ancestors.

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Copyright©2006 Manvir Singh. About the author