US Sikh Bodies Extend A Helping Hand to Uplift Life Standard of Sikligar Sikhs
Posted: 04 Sep 2018 08:38 AM PDTCHANDIGARH—Extending a helping hand to the Sikligar Sikhs for uplifting their life standard, the Sikh bodies Baba Budha Ji Chetna Lehar (USA) and Marco Foundation Helping Hand have adopted a village Bagh of Madhya Pradesh. The duo bodies have constituted a special wing named “Sikh Sikligar Wanjara Helping Hands” to make efforts for uplifting the life standard of Sikligar Sikhs.
Sharing the development with Sikh24, the BBJCL’s chief Amolak Singh and Marco Foundation’s coordinator Sohan Singh Khalsa informed that they have adopted a village of Sikligar Sikhs where the illiteracy rate is 100%. They added that their newly constituted wing has paid tuition fee of the children of Sikligar Sikhs living in village Bagh besides facilitating water bore-wells, welding machines and house repairing to the needy ones among them. “We shall make every possible effort to uplift the life standard of these Sikligar Sikhs” they said.
Sikligar Sikhs, who have inherited perfection in making weapons from their predecessors, are helpless to live their lives in extremely poor conditions due to ban on their profession by the Indian government. After banning their profession, the Indian government didn’t even make any effort to provide them employment or provide compensation for enabling them to start the new means to earn their livelihood.
Sikligars Sikhs were ironsmiths who once specialized in the craft of making and polishing weapons. Once commonly known as Gaddilohars, the term Sikligar was bestowed on these men who fashioned irons by Sri Guru Gobind Singh Ji who turned Lohgarh (the Iron fort at Anandpur Sahib) into the Sikh Armory.