When the partition of India by the British Raj in 1948 occurred, it directly affected the Punjab, which was part of both India and West Pakistan (later renamed Pakistan). The idea was to provide a place for the Muslim population to go to, leaving the other religions behind in India. It turned out to be a very blood affair, with each side slaughtering the other in an orgy of murder and mayhem.

The Sikhs, are neither Muslim, nor Hindu. They are a bonafide and separate religion, today having approximately 20 million believers. I won’t attempt to explain the details, because frankly I am ignorant of most of them. But I can tell you that what I have seen thus far, I am impressed by the Sikhs.

One of the first places I went to after I got settled in New Delhi was the Punjab. At the time, we had a big earth fill dam under construction at Talwarah, NE of Amritsar, the capital city of the Punjab state.

Amritsar is not far from the border with Pakistan. But the two countries had been fighting each other off and on for decades, so the idea of crossing the border to visit Lahore, for example, was simply out of the question. Too bad. Lahore is an important cultural center in Pakistan, with many universities and other such institutions.

Amritsar is very much like any other large Indian city, but it is distinguished by the Golden Temple of Amritsar, which is the most well known Sikh temple (Gurdwara).

The Golden Temple at first glance looks very much like all other such Indian structures. Built of beautiful white marble, meticulously decorated with carefully done inlays of semi-precious stones, mother of pearl everywhere. But it is quite different from them in that it is a living, vibrantly dynamic point for Sikhs, and all members of other religions to visit. Before entry, one is expected to remove foot gear, wash the hands, and cover the head to enter. There are no chairs. Everyone sits on the floor, and the Kartarpur Bir, the Sikh holy book is placed on an elevated dias. A Guru sits next to it, reading continuously from it, oblivious to the observers.

The Kartarpur Bir is 1,430 pages long, and was written in Gurmukhi over a period of about 200 years, with the ten Gurus of Sikhism contributing to it. So it is not like the Koran, which was entirely written by the Prophet Mohammed, dictated to scribes (he was illiterate). I was told that the Gurus at the Golden Temple have been reading continuously from the book for as long as anyone can remember. You know what? I don’t doubt it for a minute.

Once cannot help but be impressed by the atmosphere of the Golden Temple. It is full of life, and for the visitor that doesn’t begin to understand the language, or the goings on of the place, there is a curious sense of peace and tranquility that comes over him. I never made a trip to the Punjab that did not include the Golden Temple as a restful stop.

A baptized Sikh does not cut any hair from his body; he wears a turban (dastar) to cover his carefully groomed hair; he always carries a comb (kangha) to keep himself groomed; he wears the bangle (kara) on his right wrist to remind himself of the oneness of God; and he carries the kirpan, a dagger somewhere on his person at all times (similar to the sheathed knives carried by many Arab cultures).

Indira Ghandi, the Prime Minister of India in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, made an incredibly injudicious decision, at what turns out to be the end of her long career as Prime Minister, and her life. For some inexplicable reason (although I am sure that one could find an explanation for it), she sent Indian army troops into the Golden Temple, and shot the place up. It was not long after that on 31 October 1984, that she was gunned down by two of her Sikh body guards.

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