Written by Don Byrd
Yesterday’s NYTimes profiled the efforts of U.S. Army Maj. Kamaljeet Singh Kalsi, an American Sikh who in 2009 was granted the first exception in nearly 30 years from military rules restricting hair length, beards and head coverings. It didn’t come easy. Kalsi fought for two years to fulfill his desire and follow in the Sikh tradition of military service. But his exception was granted under a case-by-case policy which rarely says yes.
Now, Kalsi wants to change the rules altogether.
“Folks say, ‘If you really want to serve, why don’t you cut your beard?’ ” said Major Kalsi, a doctor who is the medical director of emergency medical services at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. “But asking a person to choose between religion and country, that’s not who we are as a nation. We’re better than that. We can be Sikhs and soldiers at the same time.”
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The more Sikhs wear military, police or firefighter uniforms, Major Kalsi reasoned, the less often Americans will see them as threatening outsiders. “When you see a Sikh firefighter save your daughter, you’ll think, ‘That’s a member of my community,’ ” said Major Kalsi, a 36-year-old father of two.
The Pentagon stresses the need for neat appearance and unit cohesion to support its policies ruling out most Sikhs from service. But successful military careers like Major Kalsi’s and the presence of Sikhs in military service around the world undermine that concern. Capable Americans who wish to join the armed forces shouldn’t be routinely restricted from doing so because of their religious observance.
