The Camp Nitnem Booklet: What Belongs in It and How It May Be Used
A gurdwara youth wing in Ludhiana is preparing a 40-page Nitnem booklet for a three-day camp for 60 students aged 12-16. Three proposals are on the table. First, a member wants a section headed 'Daily Banis' that mixes the prescribed prayers with one shabad of Bhai Gurdas and one ghazal of Bhai Nand Lal, printed without attribution so that the booklet 'looks complete'. Second, because most campers cannot yet read Gurmukhi fluently, the coordinator wants to drop the Gurmukhi text altogether and print only Roman transliteration with English meaning, arguing that students will 'at least say the words'. Third, the publicity sub-committee wants to take two lines from the booklet's gurbani extracts, print them on 300 T-shirts and 200 coffee mugs, and sell these to recover the ₹18,000 printing cost. The granthi has refused to sign off on any of the three until the youth wing gives written reasoning from Sikh sources. You are the volunteer asked to prepare that note.
1. Which banis must a Nitnem section contain if it is to reflect the Sikh Rehat Maryada, and how should the Bhai Gurdas and Bhai Nand Lal pieces be handled?
Read the worked answer
The Nitnem list is fixed by panthic maryada, not by a local committee. The Sikh Rehat Maryada prescribes for the amrit vela: Japji Sahib, Jaap Sahib, Tav-Prasad Savaiye (the ten Swayye), Chaupai Sahib and Anand Sahib; Rehras Sahib in the evening; and Kirtan Sohila before sleep. That is the full set the booklet must carry, and it must be printed accurately and completely.
Jaap Sahib, the Swayye and Chaupai come from the Dasam Granth; they are Nitnem by the Panth's decision, but attribution still matters, because only Guru Granth Sahib is the Guru. Bhai Gurdas's vaaran and Bhai Nand Lal's ghazals are honoured devotional poetry, widely recited and respected, but they are not gurbani and must never be slotted into a list of prescribed banis as if they were.
The workable fix is two clearly separate sections: 'Nitnem as prescribed in the Sikh Rehat Maryada' and 'Readings from the Sikh devotional tradition', each item carrying the author's name. The reason is not fussiness: a booklet that blurs the Guru's word with later poetry teaches 60 young Sikhs the wrong boundary on the very question the camp exists to answer. The committee should also add one short page explaining who composed what and why the distinction is kept.
2. Assess the proposal to print only transliteration and translation of the banis.
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The proposal confuses a learning aid with the thing itself. Gurbani lives in Gurmukhi, the script of Guru Granth Sahib; the shabad's form, its line breaks and its rhyme are part of how it is recited. Roman transliteration cannot reproduce the sounds consistently (jap or jaap, sahib or saheb, whether a final vowel is long or short), and 60 students reading different transliteration systems will produce 60 different recitations while believing they are reading the same bani.
The aim of Nitnem is not merely to utter sounds but to read the Guru's word, and a Sikh is expected to learn Gurmukhi. A camp of three days is exactly the place to start that, not to postpone it.
The correct design is three layers on each page: Gurmukhi as the primary text and the largest type, transliteration beneath it, and translation with a two-line note on meaning below that. The timetable should include a daily 45-minute Gurmukhi reading slot so that the transliteration is scaffolding that gets removed, not a permanent substitute. Print the pages so the Gurmukhi is never the smallest element on them, and say clearly in the preface that transliteration is for beginners only.
3. Assess the T-shirt and mug proposal, and suggest what the youth wing should do instead.
Read the worked answer
Gurbani is the Guru's word, and Sikh practice treats printed bani with respect: it is not placed on the floor, not casually handled, and old copies are disposed of respectfully rather than dumped. Printing two lines of gurbani on a mug that is drunk from, washed and eventually discarded, and selling it to recover costs, treats the Guru's word as merchandise. The objection is not sentimental; it flows from the same principle that keeps the Guru Granth Sahib on a manji under a canopy rather than on a shelf with other books. The same reasoning rules out images of the Gurus on merchandise, which maryada discourages anyway.
The financial argument is weak: ₹18,000 is a modest sum that the sangat can cover if the need is explained at the Sunday diwan, with a receipt book and accounts displayed. Better still, cut the booklet to 32 pages and print 60 copies at cost, distributing them free.
If the youth wing wants merchandise, it should use only designs the committee approves, containing no gurbani and no image of a Guru or of Guru Granth Sahib, for example a plain Khanda or the camp name. The booklet itself should be given as guru-prasad, not sold for profit, and spare copies kept in the gurdwara for respectful use.