At last the Sikhs in the New York Police Department (NYPD) can rejoice, that they can wear the turban which is religiously mandatory for them. New York Police Department (NYPD) has decided to allow Sikhs to wear turbans and beards by marking another milestone for the members of the Sikh community, although it restricts the beard size to half-an-inch.
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City Police Commissioner James O’Neill said while announcing the change in uniform and appearance policy that, “We want to make the NYPD as diverse as possible.”
Welcoming the change, the Sikh Officers Association has tweeted: “This is a proud moment for Sikh Community.”
“We look forward to reviewing the policy in depth to ensure that Sikhs can serve with their turban and beards intact and with no limitations or restrictions to either,” said the board member Kavneet Singh. Singh added that, “We commend Commissioner O’Neill on this positive step to make the NYPD a fully inclusive department.”
“We’ve been working with the Sikh officers to try to make sure we get this done,” O’Neill said after a ceremony for graduating class of the police academy. “I had the opportunity to make the change and I thought it was about time that we did that.”
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O’Neill estimated that there are about 160 Sikhs in the 34,500-strong force in the city of 8.5 million people. The new policy will be applied to the traffic police who are officially called traffic agents and wear white hats.
In April, the US Army had expanded its policy of permitting Sikh personnel to wear turbans, although it was in the nature of a waiver rather than a policy change. It was restricted to the non-hazardous duties because of concerns with using gas masks.
By Premji
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