USA: Victim Of Another Alleged Sikh Hate Crime Urges Message Of Forgiveness

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Batra was walking home in Roosevelt Island on August 7 when a group of teenagers approached him, called him “Osama bin Laden" and began attacking him.

Ahmadiyya Times | News Watch | US Desk
Source/Credit: The Huffington Post
By Antonia Blumberg | August 11, 2014

Doctor Jaspreet Singh Batra came forward on Monday as the victim of an alleged Sikh hate crime that took place in New York City less than two weeks after another Sikh man was reportedly dragged from a pickup truck in Queens. Despite the trauma of the incident, Batra offered a message of forgiveness, rooted in the very faith for which he says he was targeted.

"One thing that our culture and religion teaches us is that we have to look at the bigger picture," Batra told HuffPost. "We ask for wellbeing of all, and if we truly believe that as Sikhs then we also believe in forgiveness and wellbeing of everyone."

Batra was walking home in Roosevelt Island on August 7 when a group of teenagers approached him, called him “Osama bin Laden" and began attacking him. Batra described the incident in a statement:

"I am a physician scientist living and working in New York City. My mom and I were walking to dinner last night on Roosevelt Island. Both of us wear turbans and maintain uncut hair in accordance with our Sikh religious beliefs. As we passed a playground around 8:15pm, we were confronted by approximately 10 teenagers. They called us “Osama bin Laden” and told us to “go back to your country.” They called my mother a “bitch with facial hair.” I told them to stop, but they surrounded me. One of them punched me in the face. Another one punched me in the back of the neck. Another one tried to throw a filled soda bottle at me. As they ran away, I tried pursuing them but was dizzy and felt a lot of pain. I called the police and was treated at a hospital."

In his eight years in the United States thus far, Batra said, he has read of several Sikh-targeted attacks, the most devastating of which was the 2012 shooting at a gurdwara in Oak Creek, Wisconsin that left six dead.

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