America's largest Sikh civil rights organisation, the Sikh Coalition, has strongly opposed new headwear screening procedures put in place by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) earlier this month.
"Telling screeners to search people in turbans is the same as telling them to search black people or Arabs or Muslims. The policy allows screeners to single out travellers on the basis of their religion. The message this sends to the public is that people who wear turbans are dangerous," said Amardeep Singh, Executive Director of the Sikh Coalition. "That attitude challenges the spirit of religious pluralism on which our country was built," he said.
The Sikhs say this is racial profiling, even though screeners are also permitted to search travellers wearing cowboy hats or straw hats.
Sikhs claim that turbans do not lend themselves to hiding of explosive devices anymore than do skullcaps worn by Orthodox Jews-- a head covering that is not on the list of those that can be examined. The Sikh faith only permits the turban to be removed at home or in private.
The turban is the only form of religious garb specifically identified by the TSA as an example of headwear that could lead to secondary screening at security checkpoints. Other examples include cowboy hats and berets.
Until now turbans have been searched or removed only to resolve an unexplained alarm from an airport metal detector.
Sikh men wear turbans to cover their hair, which they leave uncut in accordance with their religion.
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