[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 18] [Extensions of Remarks] [Pages 23815-23816] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]PROFESSOR EXPOSES FAKE SIKH SCRIPTURES, HINDU PLAN TO DESTROY SIKH RELIGION ______ HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS of new york in the house of representatives Friday, December 8, 2006 Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Speaker, Professor Gurtej Singh JAS is a Professor of Sikhism and a very widely respected intellectual leader in the Sikh community. Recently, he wrote an article exposing the Dasam Granth, which is alleged by some Hindus to be a Sikh scripture. What apparently was done was to take a few of the writings of Guru Gobind Singh, the last of the Sikh gurus, and combine it with some sexually explicit material from a Hindu sect known as Shakat. The aim is to discredit Guru Gobind Singh and bring the Sikhs into the Hindu fold, according to Professor Gurtej Singh. The authors of the Dasam Granth identify themselves within the text, yet many insist that the work was written by Guru Gobind Singh and should be equal to the Sikh holy scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib. Professor Gurtej Singh commented that a leader of the militant Hindu fascist operation known as the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), which was formed in support of the Fascists, had commented that all the Sikh ``high priests'' including Akal Takht Jathedar Joginder Singh Vedanti are on the RSS payroll. Thus, they are cooperating in this effort by the Brahmins to destroy the Sikh religion. Nice trick in a supposedly secular country! Also cooperating in this effort is former Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, who led the most corrupt government in the history of Punjab. These are the kinds of people with whom the Brahins choose to ally themselves. This kind of control over the leadership of the Sikhs is one reason that they need their independence, to protect their identity and their safety before the Indians wipe them out, as they seek to do. Over a quarter of a million Sikhs killed since 1984 proves that. In addition, the Indian regime has killed over 300,000 Christians in Nagaland, more than 90,000 Muslims in Kashmir and 2,000 to 5,000 in Gujarat, as well as Christians and Muslims elsewhere in the country and Tamils, Manipuris, Dalits, Bodos, Assamese, and other minorities. Tens of thousands of people are held as political prisoners, according to Amnesty International. The Movement Against State Repression reported that lndia acknowledged holding 52,268 Sikhs as political prisoners. Many of these have been in illegal detention since 1984. [[Page 23816]] These political prisoners must be released at once and those who violate human rights must be brought to justice or we should stop all of our aid and trade with India. And we should put the U.S. Congress on record in support of freedom everywhere in South Asia in the form of a plebiscite on the subject of independence, under international supervision to ensure its fairness. Isn't that the democratic way to do things? While Professor Gurtej Singh's article is too long to put in the Record, the Council of Khalistan did an excellent press release on it. Mr. Speaker, I would like to add that press release on the Dasam Granth fraud to the Record at this time for the information of my colleagues. Professor Gurtej Singh Exposes Dasam Granth Fraud Washington, DC, December 7, 2006--Professor Gurtej Singh, a leading Sikh scholar, Professor of Sikhism, and an advisor to the International Journal of Sikh Affairs, has published an extensive article exposing how Hindu fundamentalists have promoted the Dasam Granth, which contains very little of the work of Guru Gobind Singh, as his writing and as genuine Sikh scripture, parallel to the Guru Granth Sahib. He exposes the fact that ``the Hindu plan to drag the Sikhs back to the Hindu fold'' requires promoting the Dasam Granth and that this plan has received the support of such allegedly Sikh leaders as former Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal and the high Sikh ``high priests'' led by Jathedar Joginder Singh Vedanti. Badal led the most corrupt government in Punjab's history, selling jobs for money, and regularly visits Hindu and other anti-Sikh places of worship, according to Professor Gurtej Singh. Professor Gurtej Singh writes that Jathedar Vedanti ``was given the task of actually dragging the Sikh panth into the fold of Hinduism.'' He notes that Jathedar Vedanti, like Mr. Badal, succumbed to the temptations of money. In order to carry out this nefarious plan, Professor Gurtej Singh writes, Vedanti embraced the Dasam Granth as genuine Sikh scripture, claiming that it was written by Guru Gobind Singh and was to be treated as scripture and canon. The Dasam Granth includes vivid, lewd descriptions of sex acts and other pornographic and obscene references that were added to Guru Gobind Singh's writing to make him look bad. Professor Gurtej Singh notes that the authors of the Dasam Granth identified themselves in the text. Yet the Hindus insist that Guru Gobind Singh is the author and that the book is Sikh scripture. According to Professor Gurtej Singh, it is a scripture of the Shakat sect, who are worshippers of the Hindu goddess Shiva, as it reflects their mode of worship and their practices. ``It has been a long standing Hindu desire to bring the Sikhs under the umbrella of the Shakat sect,'' he writes. ``This involves getting them to accept some of the rituals of that sect as modes of worship.'' He goes on to write, ``To propagate the dasam granth as Sikh scripture at par with Guru Granth, has been the aim of a section of the Hindu zealots and a section of the Media mostly controlled by such Hindus,'' According to Professor Gurtej Singh, Mr. Sudarshan of the fascist, Hindu militant Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), parent organization of the Hindu fundamentalist BJP, stated that all of the Sikh ``high priests'' including Vedanti are on the payroll of his organization. ``We appreciate and commend Professor Gurtej Singh for doing this outstanding work for the Sikh Nation,'' said Dr. Gurmit Singh Aulakh, President of the Council of Khalistan. ``He is doing his job as Professor of Sikhism. The Sikh Nation commends him,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``Only about 60 pages of the Dasam Granth is the writing of Guru Gobind Singh,'' he noted. ``The rest is later writings that were added and changed. Guru Gobind Singh gave guruship to the Guru Granth Sahib and ordered Sikhs to consider the Guru Granth Sahib as the living Guru,'' Dr. Aulakh noted. ``The Guru Granth Sahib is the living Guru which Sikhs accept with reverence and respect. Recitation of the Dasam Granth should not take place in any Gurdwara,'' he said. ``Sikhs should practice Rehat Maryada which was published in the 1940s by the SGPC after a long review and discussion by the Khalsa Panth.'' Dr. Aulakh said that it is very disturbing that most of the Sikh leadership is under the control of the Indian government. ``This campaign to destroy Sikhism by means of the Dasam Granth could not be taking place if we had our own homeland. We could more effectively stand up to India's ongoing effort to destroy the Sikh religion,'' he said. ``Without political power, nations perish and religions are destroyed,'' he said. India is on the verge of disintegration. Kashmir is about to separate from India. As L.K. Advani said, ``if Kashmir goes, India goes.'' History shows that multinational states such as India are doomed to failure. ``Countries like Austria-Hungary, India's longtime friend the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and others prove this point. India is not one country; it is a polyglot like those countries, thrown together for the convenience of the British colonialists. It is doomed to break up as they did. There is nothing in common in the culture of a Hindu living in Bengal and one in Tamil Nadu, let alone between them and the minority nations of South Asia,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``Freedom is the God-given right of every nation and every human being,'' said Dr. Aulakh. Sikhs must be allowed to have a free and fair plebiscite on the issue of Khalistan. In a democracy, you cannot continue to rule against the wishes of the people. As former Senator George Mitchell said about the Palestinians, `the essence of democracy is the right to self- determination,' We must reclaim the sovereignty of the Sikh Nation,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``Currently, there are 17 freedom movements within India's borders. It has 18 official languages, A country having 18 official languages cannot hold its people together for very long,'' he said. ``We hope that India's breakup will be peaceful like Czechoslovakia's, not violent like Yugoslavia's,'' Dr. Aulakh said. ``Earlier this year, Montenegro, which has less than a million people, became a sovereign country and a member of the United Nations,'' he said. ``Now it is the time for the Sikh Nation of Punjab, Khalistan to become independent.'' Dr Aulakh stressed his commitment to the peaceful, democratic, nonviolent struggle to liberate Khalistan. ``The only way that the repression will stop and Sikhs will live in freedom, dignity, and prosperity is to liberate Khalistan,'' said Dr. Aulakh, ``As Professor Darshan Singh, former Jathedar of the Akal Takht, said, `If a Sikh is not a Khalistani, he is not a Sikh.','' Dr. Aulakh said. ``We must free Khalistan now.'' ____________________