The pilgrim passage between Dera Baba Nanak and Sri Kartarpur Sahib across the border was inaugurated not during a thaw but in the middle of heightened tensions between India and Pakistan. (Photo: PTI)

For the Sikhs, the year 2019 recorded three significant events in order of their priority: a) The opening of the Kartarpur corridor between India and Pakistan; b) the Akal Takht expressing solidarity with the Kashmiris as they faced reprehensible backlash post 370, and c) the Badals opposing the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

The pilgrim passage between Dera Baba Nanak and Sri Kartarpur Sahib across the border was inaugurated not during a thaw but in the middle of heightened tensions between India and Pakistan.

AKAL TAKHT ON KASHMIRIS

The Akal Takht is the highest seat of Sikh temporal authority in Amritsar. Its Jathedar, or head, is appointed by the executive of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC), the top Sikh religious administration, which has traditionally been in control of the Akalis.

The Akal Takht Jathedar, Giani Harpreet Singh, took a firm position on Kashmiri women when some elected representatives mouthed vulgarities in the wake of the revocation of Jammu and Kashmir's special status.

"God has given equal rights to all human beings and it is a crime to differentiate against anyone on the basis of gender, caste or religion. The kind of commands given by elected representatives on social media against the women of Kashmir after the removal of special status under Section 370 are not only defamatory but also unforgivable," the Jathedar said in August.

"Kashmiri women are part of our society. It is our religious duty to defend their honour. Sikhs should come forward to protect the honour of Kashmiri women. It is our duty and it is our history."

And then, a Sikh activist from Delhi, Harminder Singh Ahluwalia, collected donations and flew 34 young Kashmiri women stuck in Maharashtra to Srinagar.

BADALS OPPOSE NRC

In his public statements, Akali MP Naresh Gujral invoked Sikh history and tradition as he opposed the Modi government's proposed National Register of Citizens.

"Punjabis, by and large, and Sikhs, in particular, believe in the philosophy of the Gurus - which is tolerance, compassion and equality and 'sarbat ka bhala (good for everyone)'," he said. "The NRC should not be implemented. We are categorically against it."

The Badals have faced a severe credibility crisis, both in religious and political spheres. They suffered a debacle in Punjab in the 2017 state elections and performed miserably in this year's Lok Sabha vote.

In the religious domain, they were accused of manipulating the Akal Takht and of a nexus with the disgraced Dera chief of Sirsa, now a convicted rapist. The series of desecrations of the Guru Granth Sahib during their rule and the use of excessive police force on peaceful protestors alienated them from Sikh masses, their core constituency, considerably in 2015.

The Badals' successive representatives in the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee, which they also control, have left much to be desired, either in terms of honest conduct or in terms of religious intellect.

The Badals' political recovery, therefore, still seems distant.

NUMBERS DON'T MATTER, INFLUENCE DOES

Notwithstanding a weak Akali leadership, community pressure eventually prevailed in 2019 - the Akal Takht's new Jathedar stood out among India's diverse religious forums when he pledged Sikh support to the Kashmiri women; the Kartarpur corridor was thrown open despite hostilities with Pakistan; and the Badals rejected the NRC, their ally's major political project.

These three events turn the notion that only the numbers matter in democracies on its head.

SIKH STAND VINDICATED, 35 YEARS LATER

The Sikhs are a tiny, microscopic minority. The party that governs their religious institutions stands at a low ebb. The powers that be are, as always, fully equipped to denigrate the entire community over any cock and bull story.

Remember, for more than a quarter-century, the Sikhs have struggled to secure justice over accusations of police atrocities during the unrest in Punjab.

Even secular liberals have sided with the state, isolating the Sikhs on the issue.

For decades, the same breed of secularists extended their intellectual support to the use of armed forces in dealing with internal security situations.

There's hardly any video evidence of lynchings, police beatings, vulgar statements from elected leaders, their communally-charged rhetoric those in power and their mass base of supporters would use brazenly against the Sikhs during the dark decades of the 1980-1990s.

But the latest videos of the communal handling of anti-CAA protests swamping social media finally vindicated what originally was the Sikh charge that iron-fisted methods become the rule rather than the exception in ultra-majoritarian politics.

Such videos targeting Muslims now, especially since 2014, have reached every corner of the planet, threatening our country's global reputation decisively.

When nationalism and sub-nationalism are on the rise worldwide, any state propaganda, fortunately, cannot separate the signal from the noise especially in this social-media age.

In 2019, the Sikhs, who had seen everything that the Muslims suffered later, sent the signal out to the BJP via the battered Akalis that what's bad for the goose is bad for the gander.

It's absolutely clear the Sikhs will never receive support from secular as well as right-wing intelligentsia on their call for justice over police excesses in Punjab during militancy.

It was only the Sikh soul that was lacerated by Operation Blue Star, not anyone else's.

A SIKH ROADMAP IN BJP's INDIA

In all pragmatism, therefore, this minority community, which the BJP needs on its side in order to maintain some semblance of fair dealing with minorities, is much better placed than before in its engagement with the state under the right-wingers.

PROJECT-BASED ALLIANCES

The Akalis - in any shape or form, with or without the Badals - need to develop the concept of issue-based alliances.

The Sikhs have a proven record of successful political consolidation from the mid-18th century. The twelve misls, or the confederacies, of Punjab, back then had their own territorial disputes. But they would all come together for brainstorming on policy decisions.

Those policy decisions, as Naresh Gujral mentioned in his comments on the NRC, were also based on the guiding principles of the Guru Granth Sahib.

REVIVING DEMOCRATIC TRADITION

The Guru Granth Sahib is not just a religious scripture, a term borrowed from Christianity, but a charter or constitution of political and social life.

If Afghan invader Ahmed Shah Abdali attacked Darbar Sahib (the Golden Temple) in 1762 and filled its pool with carcasses of cows, he knew where the Sikh power resided - the Guru Granth Sahib.

Abdali did it again in 1764 after Charat Singh of the Sukerchakia misl, the grandfather of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, had wrested Darbar Sahib back. In 1765, the Sikhs secured Amritsar and eventually hurled the Afghans out of Hindustan for all time.

The misls would always receive congregational sanction for their major political moves.

Equality lies at the core of the Sikh charter, in much the same way as American and Indian constitutions declared it centuries later.

Guru Nanak, in his writings, embraced the world as a beautiful creation of various colourful species. "Rangi Rangi Bhaati Kar Kar Jinsi Maya Jin Upaai."

Kabir's writings incorporated in the Guru Granth Sahib portray the entire humanity as pottery in varying designs made up of the same clay.

The Sikh community, in this climate of toxicity in our country, has indeed given an intelligible political direction to their leadership.

Let the same community now reinvigorate the 18th-century institution of collective brainstorming over and above the political differences that exist within.

That 18th-century institution is far more modern and democratic than the modern-day hegemony of one-party or one-family in decision-making.

No political power, if found departing from egalitarian principles, should take Sikh support for granted. It has to be project-based starting 2020.