wins 2017 Pulitzer

If anywhere Khalistan could exist, it would be Pakistan as the historical Sikh empire had its capital in Lahore and Pakistani Punjab, FATA, occupied Kashmir and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was a major part of the empire. This was the media interpretation following the release of Singaporebased author Amardeep Singh’s book chronicling his journey to explore the Sikh roots. In his book, Lost Heritage: The Sikh Legacy in Pakistan, Singh points out that 80 per cent of the Sikh empire existed in what is Pakistan.

His book was released on the second day of the fifth Islamabad Literature Festival and presents the myriad of facets of Sikh legacy in Pakistan, reports the Express Tribune, adding that this was probably the first time that Sikh legacy and heritage got center stage.
Media drew the conclusion that ‘Khalistan could only exist in Pakistan’, following a discussion on the book on 18 April at the Islamabad Litfest. Later, the news story was withdrawn, following the author’s strong denial that his book had in noway any political inference. The author has clarified that the book is purely historical in nature and context, written against the backdrop of humanity and heritage. It is devoid of any political agenda.The book is excellently researched, ‘with the sole intention of highlighting the heritage of the Sikhs as a part of his focus on discovering and documenting legacies of all communities that were impacted by partition in 1947’, the author says.
Explaining his drive to find his roots, Singh says that there always was a hunger within him to determine the history of the region, especially when his father used to reminisce about the value of what he had to leave behind in Muzaffarabad or what his mother had to sacrifice in her ancestral Abbottabad. This drive led Singh to study the history of Punjab, Khyber, Sindh and Kashmir. And there was one question that constantly buzzed in the back of his mind—political issues aside, if you had a free access to go to Pakistan, where would you go? He says that the answer young Sikhs gave him would always revolve around the two main gurdwaras in Pakistan, the Guru Nanak Sahib or Panja Sahib. ‘When you say you want to see Nankana Sahib and Panja Sahib that means today Pakistan is like Makkah and Madina for Sikhs,’ he says, adding that many have reduced the entire legacy of the Sikh community in these lands down to just religion.
Singh says over 80 per cent of the then Sikh empire existed in modern-day Pakistan but 70 pe rcent of this heritage has now crumbled into dust. The rest, he says, ‘would require a partnership with the government’. Singh adds that Islamabad could capitalise on it by turning the sites into tourist magnets. ‘Sikhs will pay money from their pockets. Open it [Sikh heritage sites] up, restore it, it’s your heritage now’, is his appeal to the government of Pakistan.