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Satinder Bains in Chandigarh
Despite attacks on some Sikhs after the terrorist strikes in New York and Arlington, US-based Sikhs visiting Punjab have reasserted their faith in American society.
Karnail Singh Ghakkewal said the attacks on Sikhs were owing to mistaken identity and did not mean Americans hated Sikhs. "American society has absorbed Sikhs into its fold and many Americans have converted to Sikhism," he claimed.
Harinder Singh Hundal, who lives in Turluck, California, said Sikhs and Americans were great friends and usually lived in harmony. "Except for a few incidents of racial discrimination in the past, Sikhs and Asians enjoy the full confidence of progressive Americans," he said.
Parampreet Singh, from San Francisco, said the killing of Balbir Singh Sodhi in Arizona was an isolated incident.
He gave the US media credit for trying to clear misconceptions about Sikhs. Defending the Americans, he said: "Just as all blacks look alike to Indians, all people wearing turbans seem the same in a foreign land."
Baljit Balli, a correspondent of the Punjabi newspaper Ajit, said a similar situation arose when relations between the US and Iran soured. The attire of Sikhs and the Shah who was ruling Iran was similar, leading Americans to confuse Sikhs with Iranians.
"Such misunderstandings have occurred under normal circumstances also. I was mistaken as a Muslim many times during my US visit last year due to a short beard and shaven head," he pointed out.
Gurpinder Kaur Sidhu, whose aunt and other family members live in New York, said Sikhs living in India had also overreacted to the attacks by Americans. "It was a spontaneous reaction because all Americans do not have a complete picture about races in the world. Now things are returning to normal," she said, after speaking to her aunt on the phone.
Baldev Sood, president of the NRI [non-resident Indian] Association in Jalandhar district, from where hundreds of Sikhs have migrated to the US, said that not one Sikh in the US had approached his group for help.
Indo-Asian News Service
South Asians under attack in the US
The Attack on America: The Complete Coverage
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