The issue of March 1, 1965 is unavailable in our archives. The following is a report from the Feb 28 issue.

NEW DELHI: Sardar Hari Singh Shergill, a Sikh leader of Amritsar, has in a letter to Mrs Indira Gandhi, Indian Information and Broadcasting Minister, complained against the “anti-Sikh matter published mostly in Hindi and other languages text-books for schools and colleges”, reports a local weekly, the “Spokesman”. The letter said: “It is often against historical facts and is twisted in order to put to ridicule Sikh Gurus, Sikh character and Sikh ways of life. Such books,” the letter said, “are generally authored by a bigoted band of writers from among the majority (Hindu) community, specially from Uttar Pradesh and other Hindi-speaking states.”

It said: “It is sometimes seen that a similar treatment is meted out to the religious faiths of other minority communities in the country by such wrong-headed writers.” Sardar Shergill warned that “such a design of Hindi fanatics — to run down the minorities and trifle with their ways of life and faiths, using Sanskritised Hindi as a vehicle to do so and disseminate Brahmanical rituals and mythology among younger generation through it — can set [in motion] a process of disintegration in the nation.”

Sardar Shergill also complained that “Jullunder station of All-India Radio was giving the same first position to the announcements in Hindi as in the Hindi-speaking states.” The Sardar said: “Punjabi being officially recognised as Punjab’s language, the policy of the Jullunder station in ignoring its claim is prejudicial to the interests not only in the Punjab region but the whole of the East Punjab.”

Published in Dawn March 1st , 2015

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