This is about an institution in New Delhi, India which has been doing amazing service for our Sikh community for nearly 30 years.
This is a wonderful charity that I have been lucky enough to be involved with my whole life and I wanted more people in the UK, the US and Canada to know what fantastic seva is being done on behalf of the Panth at the Sri Guru Granth Sahib Vidya Kender (“SGGSVK”).
Already hundreds of Sikh orphans from across India have been given shelter at SGGSVK where they are taught Gurmukhi, Santhiya and Kirtan as well as schooling in subjects such as Maths and English up to the age of 18. This has given a start in life to hundreds of children and has even led to some of the children going on to university to study subjects such as engineering and I.T. The graduates who have been given a start in life thanks to the SGGSVK are then closely involved with the orphanage when they start working thus guaranteeing vital funds for the existing children going forward.
Anyway, I had it in my mind to do more for SGGSVK but to be completely honest, I visit there every year and the sevadaars are doing such a great job, there is nothing I could possibly do to add to that. Guru Maharaaj Ji then gave me the idea that I could help them raise their profile on the internet through sites such as Sikhnet and in Western countries generally.
The point of this article is to raise awareness of this amazing service for our Sikh community. It is not only to get more donations (although of course these would be very, very appreciated and the details for how to make donations are included below if you so wish).
One of the main objectives in creating this group was simply to make you all aware (if you were not already), of the amazing seva that is going on and has been going on for nearly 30 years now. Please go and see the orphanage when you are next in Delhi because I know the young children like nothing more than seeing sangat from abroad who have come to visit them. I assure you that when you go to the Darbar Sahib and there are around 90 small children doing beautiful kirtan in front of Satguru Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji Maharaaj, there are very few places on earth where you will experience the same anand from listening to kirtan.
I also know that many of you are active in your local Gurdwara committees and so my humble beanti to all of you is to please try and arrange for some of the boys to come to the UK, Canada or the US and do kirtan for your local sangat. Their kirtan is out of this world – take my word for it – and many have been learning Gurmat Sangeet since they were 4 or 5 years old. Seeing is believing!
Sukhvinder Singh