Fringe Sikh nationalist organisation Sikh Youth UK came to prominence in 2015 in Birmingham, following the demise of the EDL’s Sikh Division. Campaigning against mixed marriages in Gurdwaras, SYUK were actively promoted via the EDL’s Sikh Division’s Official Facebook page.
Sharing the same hardline prejudice against Islam and Muslims as the EDL Sikh Division, Sikh Youth UK began to campaign against supposed targeting of Sikh teenagers by predatory Muslim-background CSE gangs. To promote this biased agenda alt-right film maker Holly Henderson produced a controversial anti-Muslim video with a hate inciting vigilante narrative entitled “Misused Trust”. This video, was endorsed by SYUK but condemned by the highly respected Sikh anti-racism group Sikhs Against The EDL who believed the video responsible for further damaging relations between community groups.
Tommy Robinson (Stephen Yaxley Lennon) returned to far right politics after being released from jail and linked up with far right Rebel Media to promote Holly’s bigoted video. Robinson exploited the Sikh community’s lack of awareness as to the true and extreme nature of Sikh Youth UK and played on the stereotype of friction between Muslims and Sikhs to encourage individuals to enter Gurdwaras to preach hatred and intolerance against Muslims. These actions of hate speech were denounced by Sikhs Against The EDL who believe that invoking prejudice goes against the universal tenets of the faith.
This article offers more insight into the worrying attitudes of the Sikh Youth UK.
To be clear, Resisting Hate fully support both Sikh and Muslim communities. It is extremist organisations like SYUK we oppose.
[…] entwined in the nationalist nostalgias of the UK. We know that the EDL has sought to gain from communalist divisions . We know also that the state has adopted increasingly authoritarian techniques in the name of […]
This is no surprise. Sikhs have always been part of far-right groups, both openly and secretly. There are many sikhs in the BNP too. The sikhs don’t realise tha they are being used.