Enraged over terming of Sikh faith as “cult” in the addendum of the Supreme Court’s November 9 judgment ordering the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya, noted lawyer and former Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA HS Phoolka is in a fix as he has found the meaning of the word ‘cult’as ‘Panth” in Punjabi and vice-versa.
Objecting to the term “Sikh cult”, Phoolka on November 14 wrote a letter to the Akal Takht and urged it to direct the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) to take legal measures to ensure removal of the word “cult” which, according to him, is not fit for the Sikh religion.
On Sunday, he wrote a fresh letter to Takht acting jathedar Giani Harpreet Singh over the issue.
“After writing a letter to you, mediapersons asked me about the meaning of cult in Punjabi. When I opened English to Punjabi dictionary, I surprised to see its meaning which is Panth. When I saw Punjabi to English dictionary published by Punjabi University Patiala, I found the meaning of Panth in English as cult,” he wrote in the fresh letter.
He added, “We don’t consider the word ‘cult’ in good sense in English language. On the other hand, we also call Sikh religion as Sikh Panth in Punjabi usually. If anyone translates Sikh Panth by seeing these dictionaries, he will surely use the term ‘cult’ for it. This might have been the reason behind using the word ‘cult’ in the addendum of the Supreme Court judgement”.
{{/usCountry}}He added, “We don’t consider the word ‘cult’ in good sense in English language. On the other hand, we also call Sikh religion as Sikh Panth in Punjabi usually. If anyone translates Sikh Panth by seeing these dictionaries, he will surely use the term ‘cult’ for it. This might have been the reason behind using the word ‘cult’ in the addendum of the Supreme Court judgement”.
{{/usCountry}}He said, “I think this matter should be gone through deeply. Either we should get ‘Sikh Panth’ translated as ‘Sikh religion’ in the dictionaries, or we use the term Sikh religion instead of Sikh Panth, so that the translator has to use term religion for Sikhs. These are my personal views and I am not a scholar. I just want to request you to form a committee of Sikh intellectuals to think over this issue, so that nobody translates Sikh Panth wrongfully.”
Notably, the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) on Friday formed a panel of senior lawyers to analyse the complete judgment in the light of Sikh tenets.
Besides Phoolka, RS Suri and APS Ahluwalia have also been included in the panel.