By Daniel Massey
The Police Department’s Office of Equal Employment Opportunity last week ruled against a Sikh traffic enforcement officer from Richmond Hill who had hoped to wear his turban and keep his uncut beard on the job to comply with his religion.
In a separate case, a Nassau County Family Court official who was president of the Sikh Cultural Society in Richmond Hill from 1978 to 1985 took the first step toward suing the town of Islip because he was twice barred from boarding flights at Long Island MacArthur Airport.
Jasjit Singh Jaggi of Richmond Hill graduated from the training academy of the NYPD Traffic Enforcement Division Friday. He was the class valedictorian and gave an address at the graduation ceremony.
But Jaggi, who has been directing traffic since December, received a letter Saturday from the NYPD’s Office of Equal Employment Opportunity saying the department had denied his request for a reasonable accommodation due to religious beliefs.
According to a source who had read the letter, it said in part: “You must conform with the present administrative guide procedure 319-20, which pertains to traffic enforcement agents and requires you must wear and maintain … a white vinyl … hat device and black chin strap.”
The ruling appeared to leave open the possibility that Jaggi could wear a uniform cap above his turban, but Professor Gurinder Singh Mann, head of the Sikh Studies Department at the University of California at Santa Barbara, said that would be tantamount to wearing no turban at all.
“The turban is a religious symbol and covering it doesn’t jive with the Sikh tradition,” he said.
The letter did not say Jaggi would be required to cut his beard, but Detective Walter Burns, a police spokesman, said the only exception granted for facial hair beyond one millimeter is a medical one.
“There are regulations that deal with facial hair and he’ll have to conform to those regulations,” he said.
Reached Monday, Jaggi said he was confused by the department’s ruling since he had received no word from the police about his beard. He was looking forward to talking with the Office of Equal Employment Opportunity in an effort to understand the decision.
“I have to think about it at this point. If they say I can keep the beard, I might have to keep working a bit more,” he said. “If they say I have to cut the beard, I have to stop working tomorrow.”
Jaggi, a former taxi driver, had previously told the TimesLedger he would go back to driving cabs before shaving his beard off. Though he takes his turban off each day when he arrives at work, Jaggi has thus far been allowed to maintain his uncut beard.
In the other case involving Sikh rights, Tejindar Singh Kahlon, 64, formerly of Flushing and an ex-president of the Sikh Cultural Society, filed a notice of claim for unspecified monetary damages against the town of Islip, which operates MacArthur Airport, on charges the airport had violated his federal and state civil rights.
Kahlon, who said he also plans to sue Southwest Airlines, missed the wedding of a friend’s daughter because airport officials asked him on successive days to remove his turban in public.
After he was escorted by airport security and a National Guardsman to a private room on Oct. 25, forcing him to miss a flight, Kahlon returned to the airport the next day, only to be asked to remove his turban again, according to the notice of claim.
“They didn’t let me go through the metal detector just because I was wearing a turban, which is blatant discrimination and racial profiling,” said Kahlon, a Nassau County Family Court hearing examiner who lives in East Meadow. He strongly supports strict airline security measures and said his “main objective is to draw attention and create some sort of feeling of sensitivity when airlines deal with people who look different.”
Asking a Sikh to remove his turban is the “highest humiliation you can put on him,” Mann said. “It’s the worst thing you can do to dishonor him. It’s not possible to take it off. It’s not a cap. It’s not a hat.”
Kahlon’s attorney, Thomas Liotti, of Garden City, said he thinks the suit will eventually be filed as a class action.
“I anticipate that there will be many more people who will come forward, all sorts of people who are being discriminated against and profiled,” he said.
An Islip town spokeswoman would not comment on the specific claim, but did say safety was the town’s No. 1 concern.
“Our obligation is to protect the health, welfare and safety of travelers,” said spokeswoman Patricia Pasciutti. “Every action that we have taken, and will take, is designed to meet that goal.”
Reach reporter Daniel Massey by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 156.
