An article by Kamelia Kliawan for Gotham Gazette reports that Sikhs, with the help of City Comptroller John Liu, are continuing to fight the NYPD’s dress code, which does not allow for turbans or beards. In October, a NYCity News Service video featured in Voices of NY covered the same issue. The Gazette explained the origins of the centuries-old tradition:<\/p>\n
\u201cIn 1699, the Sikh leader Guru Gobind Singh called on Sikh men facing persecution under the Mughal Empire to come forth as warriors to defend their community with uncut hair, representing the sanctity of the body and wearing turbans as symbols of nobility.\u201d<\/p>\n
Over 300 years later, Sikh advocates in New York are stepping up for the right of the current 19 Sikhs and the future Sikhs in the NYPD to preserve the religion’s historic heritage. An NYPD spokesman defended the department’s position:<\/p>\n
\u201cThe NYPD makes reasonable accommodations for religious beliefs, and already allows Sikh members of the service to wear turbans that fit under department headgear,\u201d NYPD spokesman Paul Browne told The New York Post in an article published in August.<\/p>\n
Browne also told the tabloid that officers are allowed to wear beards at a certain length, but added that in the case of an emergency officers may need to wear gas masks but \u201cbeards of a certain length will break the seal\u201d allowing contaminated air to enter.<\/p>\n
John Liu has initiated an online petition and last month visited the Baba Makhan Gurdwara in Richmond Hill, Queens \u2013 where many of the city’s Sikh population live \u2013 and mentioned that both the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington D.C. and MTA have changed their policies to allow turbans and beards.<\/p>\n
The head of the Sikh Cultural Society, Harpreet Singh Toor, said, in regards to Liu, \u201cWe are grateful, at least, someone is doing it.\u201d With Liu aboard, \u201cnow Sikhs have a platform for an initiative the community has had on their agenda for years.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the Sikh Coalition’s program director and attorney, Amardeep Singh, the call for dress code reform started with a lawsuit against the NYPD in 2003 after traffic enforcement agent Jasjit Singh Jaggi was told to remove his turban the previous year.<\/p>\n
Jaggi said he resigned from the NYPD in 2002 after being pressured by his supervisor to remove his turban or risk losing his job. Jaggi later filed a complaint with the city’s Human Rights Commission and, two years later upon settling his lawsuit, was reinstated as a traffic enforcement agent with the right to wear his turban and beard. The case was the first in the country where a law enforcement agency was ordered to allow a Sikh employee to wear his turban and beard on the job.<\/p>\n
However, only NYPD traffic enforcement agents are allowed to wear turbans and beards. The same religious accommodation has not applied to all Sikhs working as police officers.<\/p>\n
Singh noted that since then pressure has been mounting on the NYPD to expand the policy for all Sikhs in the police department. He described the recent win of a $184,000 lawsuit in May on behalf of eight MTA current and former employees who were, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, \u201cdenied religious accommodations\u201d under the MTA’s requirement after September 11th for employees wearing turbans to have an MTA logo or be transferred to non-public positions.<\/p>\n
But Singh said that, in a meeting in December of last year, the NYPD’s commissioner of equal employment \u201caffirmed that they won’t allow full Sikh turbans \u2026 Only as long as it fits under a NYPD police hat.\u201d The head covering currently permitted for Sikh police officers is called a patka, an article of faith most often worn by Sikh children who are growing their hair to fit in a turban.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we can’t get the NYPD to change, we will identify those who wear turbans and keep filing lawsuits,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Amardeep Singh explained that the Sikh Coalition is looking for a Sikh applicant to the NYPD who is interested in joining but does not want to remove his turban, saying, \u201cThe NYPD won’t move on an issue until there is a body to push the initiative.\u201d<\/p>\n
David Weprin \u2013 the Democratic Assemblyman for the newly-drawn district that includes Richmond Hill, home of the largest Sikh population in New York \u2013 is sponsoring legislation that would allow all uniformed departments in the city to don religious garments.<\/p>\n
Harpreet Singh Toor said that as an integral part of the Sikh faith, the turban \u201csignifies that you are a master of your own destiny. It is considered like a crown on your head \u2026 And that someone is above you.\u201d<\/p>\n
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