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Punjab da 'puttar' feels at home in Bangalore

They wear their culture on their sleeves, yet Sikhs have blended well with the locals.

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“We manage to do well wherever we go. Sikhs have no issues adjusting,” quips Chiranjivi Singh, a retired additional chief secretary of Karnataka. Having lived in Bangalore for more than two decades, Singh can’t recall any major roadblocks to being Bangalored.

“I was 24 years old when I was posted here as a sub-divisional magistrate and commissioner in 1969. At that time, the office work used to be done in English and therefore language wasn’t a problem. By the time the government issued orders to make Kannada the language for official work, I had learnt it,” says Singh.

Some 10 families set up Bangalore’s Sikh community decades ago. Today, according to ballpark figures provided by leading members of the community, their numbers have swelled to about 35,000. While a few families shifted base to the city soon after Independence, the number grew drastically during the 1984 riots in New Delhi and other parts of the country and during the IT boom in the 1990s.

Tejinder Singh, 69, was only six when he moved to Bangalore with his parents in the 1940s. Tejinder, who runs his own textile business in the city, leads a peaceful life along with his family in Cambridge Layout; his family was among the first few to settle here.

“I’ve been brought up in this city and can speak Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, and Punjabi, of course, quite fluently,” he says, adding that he frequently amazes locals here when he breaks into colloquial and rapidfire Kannada.

“The first few families lived in and around the Ulsoor area and the famous Ulsoor Gurudwara was built by them,” Tejinder recalls. “However, as the community grew in number, people obviously spread to other parts of Bangalore as well.”

Jasbir Singh Dhody, 51, is yet another member of the Sikh community who feels that he is Sikh only “by faith” whereas he is “a complete Kannadiga by ethos”. Dhody feels most people who live in Bangalore for more than three years fall in love with the city and stay back.

“The population of Sikhs living in Bangalore has more than doubled in the past 15 years,” says Dhody, who feels the only thing “typically northy” about him is his love for roti and dal.
Bhupinder Singh Lamba, 68, says that apart from learning how to park his car in the ‘Bangalorean way’ on MG Road, he had little adjusting to do. “I came to the city from Kolkata in 1989 to set up the Adidas brand in the city in association with Bata,” says Lamba. “I have seen the city grow by leaps and bounds,” he says.
Lamba feels that the city’s lifestyle is conducive to almost everyone. “However, we do miss the Bangalore that existed 20 years ago — the climate was different, there was more importance given to family life,” he elaborates.

Lamba, dressed in a khadi kurta and pyjama, also feels the Sikh community gave the city its craze for the bright salwar-kameez. “Most women in Bangalore today are comfortable wearing the salwar-kameez to work. You can say that is one contribution we have made to the city’s culture,” he says, smiling.

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