Sikh Relief (formerly SOPW)

Sikh Relief describes itself as a UK registered charity, established in 2008, that began as the Sikh Organisation for Prisoner Welfare (SOPW). Its website names two programmes: prisoner welfare, for Sikhs jailed or accused in cases it says arise from state oppression, and an education project that pays school fees for children of poor families in Punjab, alongside a "Learn to Earn" training scheme.

What it does: On its project page at the Dasvandh Network it says it gives Sikh prisoners legal advice and representation, clothing, Gurbani gutkas and pothis and money for food, and helps their families with home upkeep, children's schooling and medical grants. It also says it offers training or start-up money to prisoners after release. Its updates there describe monthly help to some prisoners' families. In August 2015 Sikh Council UK called SOPW an affiliate that had a legal team in India and a senior representative on the Bapu Surat Singh Sangharsh committee.

Who leads it: In its 2018 reply to Outlook, the charity named Balbir Singh Bains as its chairman. The sources opened name no other officer.

Key moments

• 2008: established, by the charity's account.
• 1 to 3 February 2018: Outlook's "Panth and a Foreign Hand" quotes an unnamed police officer who calls support for the families of those arrested in Punjab "indirect support for terror" and says the NIA has filed an FIR against SOPW. The article also says the NIA probe was continuing and quotes SOPW's Punjab wing as saying it was refused registration. It says Bains launched the charity and SOPW in 2013, which differs from the charity's own date.
• 20 February 2018: Sikh Relief rejects the article as defamatory. In a reply published by the Sikh Press Association it says it does only humanitarian work, that the NIA's "lengthy investigation" found nothing of note, and that none of over 200 former prisoners it has helped has reoffended.
• 11 August 2018: The Tribune, citing Indian security agencies, reports that SOPW and Sikh Relief campaigned for the release of a man detained in Portugal in 2015 over the 2009 killing of Rashtriya Sikh Sangat chief Rulda Singh, sought 100,000 pounds in donations for it, and raised donations for Jagtar Singh Johal's release.

Where it stands: The charity continues its prisoner-welfare and education work and appeals for dasvandh through the Dasvandh Network. The allegations above are those of an unnamed officer and of security agencies as reported by two newspapers; the sources opened record no court finding against the charity.