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Summary of Question:	Women With Turban
Category:	General Sikhism
Date Posted:	Sunday, 7/01/2001 1:22 AM MDT

I was just wonderring ,is it compulsory to one amratharan to have a turban on ?To my understanding,only man have turban and not woman.Thanks

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REPLY
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Dear One:

Sat Siri Akaal Ji. It depends on what you want to believe and how you want to practice. For 300 years Indian Sikh women have not worn turban. But Khalsa has no gender: all Khalsa belong to Guru and Guru belongs to them. As far as we are concerned, Guru Gobind Singh gave the Rehit not to only the Panj Piaray but to EVERYONE who identifies as Khalsa and becomes baptized. He gave ALL of us bana of turban to identify ourselves as Sikhs, not as Hindus or Muslims or just anybody. He made us Singhs and KAURS. Kaur means princess. A turban is a crown that tells the entire world you do not come at ANY price, that you cannot be bought, that you are Princess of the Guru. As far as we are concerned, if a Sikh woman takes Amrit, she must wear the bana of amritdhari Sikh.

At the very least, an amritdhari woman should keep her hair up and covered, whether or not the covering is a turban, patka, or chuni.

See other posts on this topic in Youth Forum, using searchwords "turban" & "woman", or "turban & women" or "turban & girl".

Guru rakha,