By Hardeep Singh
It was a pleasure to see Team GB perform so incredibly at the Paris Olympics. Meanwhile, another event in the sporting calendar has piqued my interest.
The inaugural Sikh Games will be held at Loughborough University in Leicestershire from 16 to 18 August. The weekend promises to have more than 20,000 spectators and 2,000 participants from across 35 regions competing at a university known as the best in the world for sports subjects.
What is involved?
The concept of the Sikh Games (a not-for-profit organisation) is nothing new. It has been running in Australia for 36 years, attracting 150,000 to 200,000 people each year. This year, they were held in Adelaide where one of the core sports was tug-of-war.
In the UK, the organisers have established partnerships with a variety of sporting bodies, such as England Boxing, the Football Association, the England and Wales Cricket Board, British Judo and British Powerlifting, the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association and the English Partnership for Snooker and Billiards. Several competitive team sports will include kabaddi, football, hockey, athletics, powerlifting and cricket — but regrettably no tug-of-war as in Australia. More than 20 sports will be played, including six for people with disability.
Moreover, there are also three non-sporting competitions: turban-tying, Punjabi-speaking and a competition to make roti bread. Good luck to the contestants in making the famously elusive round roti!
Loughborough University, which is also a sponsor of the games, will additionally be holding panel discussions on sporting issues during the weekend.
Too exclusive?
Of course, the question arises: do events like this promote exclusivity for one group, rather than inclusivity for all? The Sikh Games appear to have addressed this issue with quotas within the competitive team sports, allocating 10 per cent of places to non-Sikhs.
Mandeep Kaur Moore, president and founder of the Sikh Games, said: “We’re trying to encourage [non-Sikh competitors], if they come from an ethnic minority where they don’t have as many opportunities to go into competitions. But for the individual sports it’s Sikh-only. We need to try focus on the community, but at the same time we need to encourage other communities to also take inspiration from this.”
The Sikh Games are by no means the only faith-based sporting event or organisation, and there are others much more established, including the Maccabiah Games, the largest Jewish athletics competition in the world, which takes place every four years in Israel. The European Maccabi Youth Games was held in Hertfordshire only last week. Another example is the Muslim Sports Foundation, a UK-based charity that aims to “provide safe spaces of practice for physical activity, sport and wellbeing to Muslim communities across the nation”.
Opening night
The opening ceremony of the Sikh Games will be held this Thursday, 15 August, at the National Ice Centre in Nottingham, and includes appearances from Punjabi singer-songwriters Satinder Sartaaj, Jaz Dhami, and Jazzy B. It will be hosted by the disability activist Dr Shani Dhanda.
The ceremony includes a “breathtaking” display of Gatka, Sikh martial arts and is billed as “a night of spectacular and unique performances, celebrating Sikh tradition, heritage and culture. Witness the UK’s Sikh community come together in a celebration of unity and sport, for the first time in the UK’s history.”
