Savage Vandals ransack Sikh centre in Woolgoolga

Cultural artifacts and antiques lost in the attack, Rohit Revo reports.

Woolgoolga, located 550 km north of Sydney and 400 km south of Brisbane is the biggest community of Sikhs in rural Australia. The township’s population is 50% Sikh, and over 95% of Woolgoolga’s banana industry is owned and operated by Australians of Sikh ancestry. Sikhs began arriving in Woolgoolga in the 1960s when Queensland laws prohibited many migrants from owning land, so they ended up around the northern rivers district of NSW, following the work, until they moved to Woolgoolga.

Salinder Singh Salindera, started a private enterprise in 1989 in Woolgoolga and called it Raj Mahal centre. It had a museum with lot of antiques, train rides, tourist complex, take away and specialty shops till it was hit by recession and scaled down. On 2nd February, Sailender Singh left the premises at 3.15 pm to take his wife to the doctor and came back around 5.30 pm to find the centre vandalized.

Talking to The Indian, he said, “The complex had a fire hose which the vandals used to flood the restaurant, soaking the carpets. The water through the hose was flowing when I came in. I rang the police but they were held up because of a fire arm hold up in the area. They came later along with forensic experts and it appears this is not a destruction which is caused by a single person. This looks like the work of 4-5 people who had been causing destruction since 2 hours.” However says Singh, “Robbery doesn’t appear to be the motive and it looks like a case of vandalism. The coins and scriptures were not stolen as the vandals may have realized there could be no financial gain with the museum items.”

The museum had in its collections the full Sikh history depicted in silk paintings and collection of 500 year old hand written scripts. The museum also housed a Quran written in Sanskrit. The highlight of the museum was a sword bought from UK, belonging to Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Legend has it that when Ranjit Singh’s Commander-in-chief Hari Singh Nalwa conquered Kandahar and defeated its general Dost Mohamed Khan, he surrendered this sword as a mark of surrender, as was the practice in those days. Hari Singh Nalwa was one of the greatest of Sikh generals and he was compared to the great European Generals such as Napoleon, Field-Marshal von Hindenburg, the Duke of Wellington, as well as Asian Generals such as Haluka Khan and Genghis Khan.  So feared was Nalwa in those days in Afghanistan that mothers used to mention him to instill fear in their children. The sword had the inscription of government stamp and names in Persian. This sword was used by vandals and also used to destroy other things in the museum. The historic sword has been missing since then.

The museum also had a 1.3 sq mt Taj Mahal replica carved out of solid block of marble which took 5 people 10 years to build and cost 45,000 AUD in 1985 and was bought from India. This was vandalized as well. The vandals also attempted to break the bronze statue of Maharaja Ranjit Singh but did not succeed and instead dumped it on the ground. Several statutes and mannequins which were airlifted from India have been smashed. The bronze statue of Master Tara Singh, a prominent Sikh religious leader in the first half of the 20th century and founder of Shiromani Gurdwara Prabhandak Committee, was lifted and thrown at the Taj Mahal.

 “The way statues have been thrown to the ground have been inspired by seeing fall of Saddam’s statue in Baghdad which was beamed to a million audiences around the globe. Some people think there is no difference between the Talibans and Sikhs as both wear turbans around their heads. This can be a racially motivated attack.” said Salinder.

Salinder fondly remembers the happy times and mentions Charanjit Singh Atwal Dy. Speaker of Lok Sabha and Maneka Gandhi have visited this place. The attack was particularly heartbreaking for Salinder as he had a heat attack last year which forced him to close the adjoining restaurant. Deeply missing the sword, he says there is only one of its kind in the world and no way to substitute it and thinks the vandals may have thrown this in some gutter. He says media can build pressure and with limited police resources and increased robbery and murders it may take time to solve this. Deeply disturbed…he says ‘Talwar kahin mil jaye…kaun jane….”

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