Private 1st Class Jaskirat Singh made Marine Corps history earlier this year when he completed boot camp with a turban and beard — two essential parts of his Sikh faith. Singh’s achievement was made possible not only by his own hard work, but by a 30-year-old religious freedom law that creates legal options for people who can’t comply with a federal policy without violating their faith. Singh’s challenge was that Marine Corps uniform rules prevent recruits from wearing head coverings and maintaining a beard.
That is why the followers of Sikhism do not worship deities; they just follow the teachings of their gurus. The 10th Guru Gobind Singh declared the Guru Granth Sahib to be the eternal guru after him, a collection of teachings from not just Sikh gurus but from insights and sayings of sages of all faiths.
A 19-year-old Sikh on a New York City bus was attacked in a suspected hate crime assault by an assailant who tried to remove his turban while saying, “We don’t wear that in this country,” police say.