A Twitter video goes viral where a police officer at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, confiscates a kirpan from a Sikh student and handcuffs him even though he offered to take it off.

Incident In Detail

On 22 September 2022, at the University of North Carolina, in the United States, a Sikh student was handcuffed for carrying a kirpan with him. The kirpan is a sacred dagger worn by traditional Sikhs and is considered to be one of the five discernable tokens of the Sikh Khalsa.

The incident occurred on Thursday but was brought out in the open on Saturday after one of the students shared the video of the event on Twitter and it went viral. 

In the video, it is clearly visible that the boy is trying to stop an officer from confiscating his kirpan. He suggested that he would take it off, but the police officer put handcuffs on him instead. 

Officer handcuffing the Sikh student

The student said, “I wasn’t going to post this, but I don’t think I will receive any support from @unccharlotte. I was told someone called 911 and reported me, and I got cuffed for “resisting” because I refused to let the officer take my kirpan out of the miyaan.”


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University Issues An Apology

The Chief Diversity Officer, Bradon Wolfe and Chancellor, Sharon Gaber at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, recorded a statement that says, “Police officers responded to the scene and engaged the individual in question. During this interaction, the individual was placed in handcuffs while officers took possession of the object. The handcuffs were removed after the object was retrieved.”

Sharon Gaber further added, “State law and University policy prohibit the possession of a knife or other edged instruments on campus, but we will use this as a learning opportunity by engaging in constructive dialogue with Sikh students and employees.” 

A kirpan

With this, the university offered an apology to the accused Sikh student for having hurt his religious sentiments. They also assured the young man that an incident like this shall not take place in the future again.

“Our diversity makes us a better, richer, more successful community. We want every Niner to feel welcomed, supported and safe. We apologize that is not what this young man felt in our union yesterday,” the statement said. 

Twitter Users Express Their Resentment

A number of tweets revealed the outbreak of rage on this incident as it hurt the emotions of a particular religious group.

One of the users tweeted, “This must be looked into and the officer must be reprimanded and trained so that he knows the legality of baptised Sikhs carrying religious items. There have never been any problems with Sikhs carrying these for many years.”

Let us know about your point of view in the comment section below. 

Disclaimer: This article is fact-checked


Image Credits: Google Photos

Feature Image designed by Saudamini Seth

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This post is tagged under: Sikh, Sikhism, kirpan, US, United States, University of North Carolina, Charlotte, religious sentiments, student, religious rights, religion, college campus, handcuffed, Twitter, twitter video, viral

Disclaimer: We do not hold any right, copyright over any of the images used, these have been taken from Google. In case of credits or removal, the owner may kindly mail us. 


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