For Sikhs, this responsibility is not a new concept. Every day, Sikhs ask for Sarbat da Bhala in our ardaas (sikh prayer) – the wellbeing of all. Protecting children, supporting survivors, and creating spaces where everyone can participate in the sangat safely are direct expressions of that prayer.
As Manjit Kaur for Asia Samachar writes, "For a faith grounded on principles of justice, equality and welfare of all (Sarbat da Bhala), the Sikh community must ask itself hard questions. How have we allowed some religious leaders to become so powerful, so unaccountable? Why are survivors still met with silence, disbelief, or accusations of bringing shame to the Panth?"2
Creating safer Sikh spaces is not about adopting outside ideas; it is about living the values our faith has always taught us.
This also requires us to rethink where responsibility belongs. Too often, conversations about sexual abuse focus on what children, women, or vulnerable people should have done differently. In reality, responsibility always rests with the person who chose to cause harm. However, responsibility does not end there. Communities also have a duty to respond when abuse is disclosed, when warning signs are identified, or when someone in a position of trust misuses their influence. Accountability extends beyond the legal system. Sikh leaders and institutions have a moral and ethical responsibility to take allegations seriously, inform the broader community where appropriate, and implement meaningful consequences that protect others from harm.3
Accountability is not simply about responding after abuse has occurred - it is one of our strongest tools for preventing future abuse. Communities that consistently hold perpetrators accountable send a clear message that abusive behaviour will not be tolerated. This shifts the focus away from asking potential victims to protect themselves and instead places responsibility where it belongs: on those who commit abuse and those who enable it.
When institutions choose silence, prioritize their reputation, or quietly move an abusive individual into another position of influence, they create opportunities for further harm. Removing someone without transparency or allowing them to continue working in other Sikh spaces does not solve the problem. It simply transfers the risk to another community.4
How a community responds also shapes a survivor's healing. Research has found that positive social support can reduce post-traumatic stress and improve recovery outcomes, while blame, disbelief, or isolation can deepen trauma.5 One survivor in the study reflected, "After listening to the other women I realised the problem is of a different nature; it is not something I did wrong. I was able to put the responsibility where it belonged."
Similarly, Saprea's research6 on healing from child sexual abuse highlights that shame often thrives in silence, but begins to lose its power when survivors are believed, supported, and reminded that the abuse was never their fault. Every compassionate response has the potential to change not only one person's healing journey, but the culture future survivors will encounter.
Our history reminds us that standing beside those who are vulnerable has always been part of the Sikh way of life. Santbir Singh with Kaur Life recounts how Bhai Fauja Singh Ji intervened to rescue a woman who was being sexually assaulted by police officers, accepting imprisonment rather than allowing injustice to continue.7 Likewise, during the Dharam Yudh Morcha, Sant Baba Jarnail Singh Ji insisted that those who harmed women be dealt with severely and that women experiencing violence be protected. These examples remind us that defending the vulnerable is not a modern expectation placed upon Sikhs – It is a tradition deeply woven into our history, traced back to the times of when our Guru Sahib’s walked on this earth.
Creating a safer sangat means refusing to look away when harm occurs. It means believing survivors, holding those who cause harm accountable, expecting transparency from our institutions, and ensuring that the safety of our children and vulnerable community members always comes before the reputation of any individual or organization. If we truly pray for Sarbat da Bhala, then we must also be willing to take responsibility for creating a community where that prayer is reflected in our actions.
Within the Sikh and Punjabi community, respect for others is one of our greatest strengths. We are taught to honour our parents, listen to our elders, value our teachers, and respect those who dedicate their lives to seva. We look up to granthis, kathavachaks, pracharaks, ustaads, committee members, camp leaders, and older members of the sangat because they often possess knowledge, experience, and wisdom that can help us grow.
These relationships are not inherently dangerous. In fact, they are often beautiful expressions of mentorship, guidance, and community. However, respect should never become unquestioning obedience.
When someone is viewed as especially spiritual, knowledgeable, or influential, it can become incredibly difficult for others to challenge their behaviour, question their decisions, or recognize when boundaries have been crossed. The University of Queensland's Respect Program9 explains that power imbalances are not automatically harmful, but they can make it difficult (or sometimes impossible) for the person with less power to freely say "no," even when they genuinely want to. A person may fear disappointing a respected mentor, losing opportunities within the community, damaging family relationships, or no longer feeling accepted within the sangat.
Members of our community, and especially children, are often taught to trust religious leaders without question because those leaders are seen as representing God or possessing spiritual authority.10 An abuser may misuse this trust by suggesting that obedience is a sign of faith, that questioning them is sinful, or that God desires the abusive behaviour. These manipulative tactics exploit both spiritual beliefs and power imbalances, making it extremely difficult for victims to recognize the abuse or speak out against it.
Some power dynamics are obvious.
Others are far more subtle.
Within Sikh spaces, power may exist between:
Power can also exist simply because one person is older, more experienced, financially secure, socially respected, or viewed as being "closer to Guru Sahib." None of these relationships are inappropriate by themselves, but every one of them requires the person with greater power to maintain healthy boundaries and act with integrity.
Power is not only created by positions - it is also shaped by culture.
The Association of Alberta Sexual Assault Services (AASAS)11 explains that systems of oppression such as sexism create unequal power relationships long before abuse ever occurs. These systems influence how we value people, who we believe, and whose voices carry authority. Sexual violence is rooted in power and control, and these unequal power structures help create the conditions in which abuse can occur.
Within many Punjabi communities, girls are often raised to be respectful, accommodating, and obedient, while boys are often given greater freedom, authority, and decision-making power. These expectations are not part of Sikh teachings, but they have become deeply embedded through generations of patriarchal cultural norms. Over time, these messages subconsciously shape how men and women relate to one another. If boys grow up believing they should lead while girls learn they should avoid conflict or prioritize the wishes of others, unequal power dynamics become normalized long before adulthood.
These gender expectations also influence who holds positions of authority within our communities. Although Sikhi teaches the equality of women and men, women continue to be underrepresented in many positions of religious, organizational, and community leadership. Committee memberships, decision-making roles, speaking platforms, and positions of influence are still disproportionately occupied by men in many Sikh institutions. When one gender consistently holds greater authority while the other is expected to follow, those power imbalances become normalized and are reinforced from one generation to the next.
This does not mean that men in leadership are inherently abusive, nor does it suggest that leadership itself is the problem. Rather, it highlights how unequal access to power can create environments where abuse is more easily concealed, victims feel less able to challenge authority, and institutions may be more inclined to protect influential individuals than those with less power. As AASAS explains, systems of oppression shape who is believed, who is valued, and who is given authority. Challenging these inequalities is therefore an important part of preventing sexual violence.
Creating a safer sangat requires more than responding to abuse after it happens. It also requires examining the cultural messages we pass on to our children, ensuring women have meaningful opportunities to lead and make decisions, and fostering communities where respect is never confused with unquestioning obedience and authority is always accompanied by accountability.
One of the most harmful myths surrounding sexual abuse is the belief that survivors could have simply walked away, said "no," or fought back.
McAdams, a physician writing in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, describes her own experience of being sexually harassed by a senior colleague during medical training.12 Looking back, she struggled to understand why she had not asserted herself more forcefully. Only years later did she realize that the power imbalance had profoundly affected her ability to respond. She explains that her reactions felt more like reflexes than conscious choices and that deeply ingrained cultural messages led her to blame herself rather than the person who abused his position of authority. Her story reflects what many survivors experience: confusion, self-blame, and difficulty understanding their own responses until they learn how power dynamics influence human behaviour.
Similarly, the Government of Canada's Spectrum of Sexual Misconduct training13 explains that power imbalances often reduce a person's ability to resist unwanted behaviour or clearly communicate that it is unwelcome. The presence of authority, influence, or dependence can significantly affect a person's ability to freely consent.
When thinking about any relationship, consider asking:
Recognizing power dynamics does not mean assuming the worst about every relationship. It means becoming aware of the ways influence operates so that trust can exist alongside accountability. Healthy leaders welcome transparency, respect boundaries, and never use their position to obtain compliance, loyalty, or intimacy. Creating a safer sangat begins by understanding that where power exists, responsibility must always exist alongside it.
Healthy boundaries are the limits we set to protect our physical, emotional, spiritual, and personal well-being. They help us build relationships based on mutual respect, trust, and consent, while allowing everyone to maintain their own identity, autonomy, and sense of safety. Boundaries are not about pushing people away—they create the conditions for healthy, respectful relationships to grow.
Healthy relationships are built on:14
Setting boundaries means deciding what you are comfortable with and communicating those limits to others. Healthy people respect those boundaries, even when they are disappointed. They do not pressure, guilt, manipulate, or punish someone for saying "no." Boundaries can include physical touch, communication, privacy, emotional support, time commitments, or spiritual guidance. Everyone has the right to establish and maintain boundaries, regardless of age, status, or experience.15
Boundary violations rarely begin with obvious abuse. More often, they develop gradually through a series of small actions that slowly normalize increasingly inappropriate behaviour. This process, often referred to as boundary testing or boundary blurring, can make it difficult to recognize when a relationship has become unhealthy.
Healthy boundaries begin to blur when:
In unhealthy relationships, a person may try to monitor where you are, isolate you from others, pressure you into activities you are uncomfortable with, criticize your appearance or behaviour, or make you feel responsible for their emotions. They may also use dramatic statements, guilt, or fear to discourage you from setting boundaries.16
For individuals who have experienced trauma or repeated boundary violations, recognizing healthy boundaries can be especially difficult. Research on childhood trauma shows that people with collapsed boundaries may struggle to say "no," prioritize others' needs over their own, feel responsible for other people's emotions, doubt their own judgment, or rely on others to tell them what is true or right. These experiences can make it easier for manipulative individuals to exploit trust and harder to recognize when boundaries are being crossed.17
Some relationships naturally involve a power imbalance. Teachers, coaches, counsellors, ustaads, mentors, and spiritual leaders are all entrusted with guiding others. This position of trust carries a responsibility to maintain clear, healthy boundaries.
A boundary violation is:18
Importantly, responsibility for maintaining these boundaries always lies with the person in the position of authority - not with the person seeking guidance or support.
Within Sikh communities, many people seek guidance from ustaads, granthis, kathavachaks, pracharaks, camp leaders, or other respected members of the sangat. These relationships can be deeply meaningful and can support spiritual growth. However, admiration and trust should never become dependence.
The Sikh Rehat Maryada teaches that Dhan Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji is the eternal Guru, and that Sikhs are guided through Gurbani, the Guru, and the sangat. While spiritual teachers may share knowledge and guidance, they are not meant to replace an individual's relationship with Guru Sahib.
Applying these Sikh principles to safeguarding means that healthy spiritual leaders:
Likewise, Sikhs can help safeguard their own spiritual well-being by remembering that Waheguru is not limited to one person, place, or institution. Our connection with Guru Sahib is not dependent on receiving approval from a particular leader. Spiritual guidance can be valuable, but it should always strengthen, not replace, our own relationship with Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji.
Your spirituality is precious. If a relationship begins to make you feel fearful, pressured, dependent, isolated, or unable to trust your own conscience, it is worth pausing and reflecting. Healthy spiritual guidance should leave you feeling empowered, supported, and more connected to Guru Sahib. If that is not happening, be reflective and mindful of your situation. Consider whether your boundaries are being respected and whether the relationship feels healthy and safe.
Creating a safer sangat begins with creating a culture where every person is treated with dignity, respect, and care. Safe environments do not exist simply because abuse has never been reported. They are created intentionally through the values, policies, and practices a community chooses to uphold. Every policy, every conversation, and every response to harm communicates what a community is willing to tolerate and what it is committed to protecting.
According to Safe Kids Thrive19, creating a safe environment means intentionally reducing opportunities for abuse before they occur. Their framework identifies five key areas of safety: visibility, access, supervision and communication, transportation, and safe technology use. In practice, this includes designing spaces with clear sightlines, monitoring who enters and leaves facilities, ensuring that every child is appropriately supervised, enforcing clear codes of conduct, and making all one-on-one interactions between adults and children observable and interruptible.
Safe Kids Thrive emphasizes that these safeguards are not about mistrusting individuals. Instead, they are about creating environments where children and vulnerable people are protected through thoughtful planning and shared responsibility.20
Creating safe environments also requires clear and consistent policies. Expectations surrounding appropriate behaviour, supervision, and safeguarding should be communicated openly, understood by everyone, and applied equally regardless of an individual's role or reputation within the community.
Policies alone cannot create safety. The Church of England's Safeguarding Manual21 explains that healthy communities are protective, preventative, healing, and restorative. They are communities where there is genuine open dialogue, different perspectives are welcomed, everyone is valued and respected, harmful behaviour can be challenged by anyone, power is shared rather than concentrated, safeguarding is actively promoted, and survivors are heard, supported, and responded to. These characteristics create communities where abuse is less able to flourish because accountability is woven into everyday community life rather than only appearing after harm has occurred.
The same safeguarding guidance also reminds us that abuse is not always committed by those with formal titles or positions. In the context of spiritual abuse, it explains that abuse can occur from leaders, peers, or influential members of a congregation. While institutional power can make abuse especially difficult to challenge, influence itself carries responsibility. Whether someone is a committee member, granthi, sevadar, respected elder, teacher, or simply someone held in high regard within the community, accountability must remain the same. No individual should ever become so influential that they cannot be questioned.
In the Kaur Life article Confronting Sexual Assault in Sikh Spaces,22 lawyer Harjot Kaur observes, "We need to be better at creating safe, nonjudgmental spaces to talk about sexual assault. When we don't, the pain lingers." Her words challenge Sikh communities to reflect on whether our gurdwaras and community spaces truly feel safe for survivors to disclose abuse. If survivors do not feel believed, supported, or respected, then we have work to do.
The article recommends practical ways to create safer Sikh spaces:
It also encourages Sikh communities to:
The authors of Confronting Sexual Assault in Sikh Spaces23 also remind us that creating safer environments requires confronting the broader culture that allows abuse to persist. They describe rape culture as an environment where sexual violence is normalized or excused through victim-blaming, misogynistic language, objectification, rigid gender expectations, and questioning survivors instead of those who caused harm. While these behaviours may appear minor in isolation, together they contribute to a culture where abuse is more easily dismissed and survivors are less likely to seek help.
The article calls on Sikh communities to actively dismantle these harmful norms by:
Creating a better culture means making respect, equality, and accountability part of everyday community life rather than responding only after harm has already occurred.
Our Gurus taught us to build communities grounded in justice, humility, and seva. Creating safer environments is an extension of those teachings. It asks us to move beyond reacting after harm has occurred and instead become proactive in preventing abuse, supporting survivors, and holding one another accountable. Every conversation we have, every policy we implement, every harmful comment we challenge, and every vulnerable individual we protect contributes to the kind of sangat we hope to build.
Preventing sexual abuse is not about expecting children or vulnerable individuals to protect themselves. It is about creating informed, prepared, and proactive communities that reduce opportunities for abuse before it occurs. Effective prevention requires adults to recognize concerning behaviours, create safe environments, speak openly about abuse, and respond early when something does not seem right. Many organizations have developed practical frameworks to help communities do exactly that.
One of the most important messages from Stop It Now!24, an international child sexual abuse prevention organization, is that preventing abuse is the responsibility of every adult, not every child. Their prevention framework emphasizes that children should never be expected to recognize grooming, challenge inappropriate behaviour, or stop abuse on their own. Instead, communities of informed adults must work together to identify concerns, support one another, and create environments where abuse is less likely to occur.
To help communities remember this shared responsibility, Stop It Now! developed the Four R's of Prevention:25
Together, these four principles encourage communities to move away from silence and toward shared accountability.
Another practical framework comes from Darkness to Light, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preventing child sexual abuse. Their resource, 7 Steps to Protecting Our Children: A Guide for Responsible Adults26, reminds us that prevention is an ongoing process rather than a single action. The guide encourages adults to:
Together, these seven steps remind us that prevention begins long before abuse is disclosed. Every informed conversation, thoughtful policy, and proactive decision contributes to creating safer communities.
Many of these same principles apply directly to gurdwaras and other Sikh community spaces. Stop It Now!27 encourages faith communities to openly acknowledge that sexual abuse can occur within religious settings and to implement practical safeguards before harm occurs. These include completing background checks for staff and volunteers who work with children, adopting a two-adult rule so children are not alone with one adult, designing physical spaces that reduce opportunities for isolation, encouraging community members to question behaviours that seem concerning, and creating clear procedures for responding to inappropriate conduct, even before there is proof that abuse has occurred.
The organization also emphasizes that responding to abuse is not enough. Communities should establish policies in advance, discuss difficult situations before they arise, and determine how concerns will be handled if they occur. Planning ahead creates consistency, reduces confusion, and demonstrates a genuine commitment to protecting children.
Prevention also begins within families. Through its Everyday Actions initiative28, Stop It Now! encourages parents and caregivers to create family safety plans that promote healthy boundaries, respectful communication, and open conversations about body safety.
This includes:
The organization also encourages adults to practise speaking openly about uncomfortable topics before problems arise. When families normalize conversations about consent, boundaries, and safety, children are more likely to recognize concerning behaviours and feel comfortable seeking help if something happens.
Prevention also involves creating trustworthy systems that respond effectively when abuse is disclosed. In Confronting Sexual Assault in Sikh Spaces,29 Kaur Life explores how Sikh traditions might inform modern, survivor-centred approaches to accountability.
The authors invite Sikh communities to reflect on how the institution of the Panj Piare (historically used to maintain justice and accountability within the Panth) might be thoughtfully reimagined in ways that are transparent, survivor-informed, and rooted in Gurmat. They emphasize, however, that any such system must prioritize the wellbeing of survivors, involve individuals who are properly trained in trauma-informed practice and sexual assault response, and work alongside appropriate legal processes when necessary.
Rather than offering a single solution, the article encourages Sikh communities to ask difficult but necessary questions about how justice, healing, and accountability can be strengthened within our own institutions.
Communities grounded in the principles of justice, equality, and Sarbat da Bhala must ask themselves difficult questions: What structures must we build to ensure abuse is stopped?30 Prevention is not achieved through hope alone. It requires communities that are willing to educate themselves, establish safeguards, challenge harmful behaviour, respond to concerns, and continuously improve the systems designed to protect the most vulnerable. When prevention becomes everyone's responsibility, safer sangats become possible.
