SikhArchive

Hi, I’m Sukhraj Singh from Sikh Archive and welcome to the eighth episode in our Podcast series of conversations with historians, authors, academics, journalists and activists on topics related to their areas of expertise on Sikh or Panjabi history.

In this episode we are joined by Professor Ronki Ram who is a leading scholar on the study of Caste with a particular focus on it in Punjab. We discuss the definitional constructs of Caste, how it manifests in Panjab, how it compares with across other Indian states and how it fits with a Jatt identity in Panjab.

Hi my name is Sukhraj Singh and welcome to the seventh podcast episode by SikhArchive in our Sikh history series, where today we are joined by PhD researcher Asha Sawhney, to discuss the Sikhs of Iran with respect to the religious association between Iran and Sikhi as well as the current day community that migrated there throughout the 20th century. 

Asha is well versed in Sikh literature and used to work with the Sikh Research Institute where she had hosted several episodes about the persian contributions in Gurbani and Sikh philosophy. She also has Iranian Sikh heritage and has conducted a lot of independent research on the history of the Iranian Sikh community in documenting their oral history.

In this episode we discuss the legacy of Guru Nanak in Iran, the linguistic identities of Persian in Sikhi as well as the significance of the geographical position of Iran. And in the second half, we take a look at the history of the diaspora, the impact the revolution had on the Sikh community and their current standing in the country with regards to their legal status and minority rights. 

Hi, I’m Sukhraj Singh and welcome to the sixth history podcast by SikhArchive, today we are joined by the journalist and activist Phil Miller from the organisation called Declassified UK, to discuss his monumental work of 2014 which exposed the British involvement and collaboration with the Indian State in 1984 regarding operation bluestar and the State violence that subsequently followed. 

In January 2014, Phil Miller went to the national archives in London to research documents that had just been declassified by the British government regarding any files related to the foreign office in 1984. What he had come across with reference to India and the Sikhs of 1984 has radically changed the narrative concerning any discussion on operation bluestar, especially for the Sikhs that reside in the UK. 

I reached out to him as we approach the remembrance of the battle of amritsar 36 years on to talk to him about his research, methodology, the challenges he faced and other important talking points related to his work and findings, including his information tribunal appeal that followed in the years after for his fight for further documents that remain classified which may reveal much more regarding what happened after 1984 and also to what extent the SAS and intelligence services were involved. 

Hi my name is Sukhraj Singh and welcome to the fifth podcast episode by SikhArchive in our Sikh history series, where today we are joined by the author and activist Zarina Patel from Kenya, to discuss her book, “Unquiet”: which explores the life and times of Makhan Singh, who was the great trade unionist and anticolonial revolutionary in Kenya.

I’ve been wanting to do this podcast for a very long time because I am deeply inspired by the life and activism of Makhan Singh. Not only was he a marxist and a trade unionist but he was the founding father of the trade union movement in Colonial Kenya and eventually formed the East African Trade Union congress.  His labour organising was a key moment in history in the build-up to the Mau Mau uprising and the Kenyan independence movement. In fact, he was imprisoned by the British for 11 years without charge or trial for largely being a voice against colonial rule and invoking independence. 
In this episode we discuss with Zarina Patel what inspired her to write the book and her methodology, who was Makhan Singh as a person, his affiliation with the Ghadar Party and some of the reasons why he is a lesser-known person in South Asian history.

Hi, I’m Sukhraj Singh from Sikh Archive and welcome to the fourth episode in our Podcast series of conversations with historians, authors, academics, journalists and activists on topics related to their areas of expertise on Sikh or Panjabi history.

In this episode we are joined by Professor Kama Maclean, who is a professor of South Asian History and the author of the book, “A Revolutionary History of Interwar India: Violence, image and Text, which we will be discussing today. 

The book delivers a fresh perspective on the revolutionary activity that was taking place in the build up to the independence movement with a strong focus on the Hindustan Socialist Republican Army formed by Chandrashekar Azad and Bhagat Singh. 

We discuss a lot of important themes in our conversation such as the important role that the revolutionaries played in influencing Congress policy and provoking colonial responses, in the process bringing India closer to independence…. as well as... understanding why the revolutionaries of the HSRA have long been marginalised in the academic historiography of nationalism, despite their extraordinary popularity in popular culture.

Hi my name is Sukhraj Singh and Welcome to the second episode of SikhArchive podcasts, a series of conversations with historians, authors and academics on topics related to their areas of expertise of Sikh history.

In this episode, we are joined by Professor Karen Leonard, who is a historian and anthropologist at the University of California. With a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin (1969) on the history of India Mexican Americans, South Asian Americans, and Muslim Americans.

This episode is about her book, Making Ethnic Choices, which was published in 1992 and is a thorough study about the Punjabi Mexican community, its formation and a fantastic oral history expose on the early Sikh pioneers of California.

Hi, I’m Sukhraj Singh from SikhArchive and welcome to the 1st episode of our Podcast series of conversations with historians, authors, academics, researchers, and activists on topics related to their areas of expertise on Sikh or Panjabi history.  

In our conversation, we discuss her most recent article titled “I get peace:” Gender and Religious life in a Delhi Gurdwara. We also talk about her field work in Delhi, what it means to be a widow in North India and the role of the Shaheedganj Gurdwara among many other important talking points.