Manika Kaur: Manika Kaur of Indian decent, but born and raised in Australia, grew up in a spiritual
house where music, song and devotion were a way of life. Every evening the whole family would have a
“jam session” where they would play the tablas, harmonium and sing together. This led her on the path of
becoming a singer and songwriter. Once she got married, she moved to Dubai, (very different from living
in chilled-out Melbourne!), and here she realised that she needed to do something positive with her time
and was then lead on the path of creating a music CD that would help support financing the building of
the first Gurdwara in Dubai (which raised over a million dhirams) where she now lives with her husband
and son. As she had a wonderful voice, and interest in singing and a determination to do something, she
started her efforts in Australia itself. Although, she had no formal training in music, her efforts succeeded in
getting an English song recorded before moving to Dubai. In Dubai, she recorded some more English music
with another producer and went on to win a radio competition (by popular vote) for singing an original
composition in December 2008. A chance social encounter with the well known singer Sukhbir shaped her
dream of recording a Kirtan CD to raise funds for building the Dubai Gurdwara. She collaborated with
internationally acclaimed bhangra/pop singer Sukhbir to create this CD, essentially to raise funds for the
Gurdwara being built in Dubai, and in just over a month of its release, the CD raised one million dirhams.
Then she planned her next album to help educate children from the rural parts of Punjab. This album titled ‘I
Bow To You Waheguru’ also since been released for the noble cause. Thus, Manika has adopted the medium
of music to spread the message of Gursikhi Jeewan, Sewa te Simran. Her words and actions make her a true
role model. After completing her first mission of financing the Gurdwara constructions, now her mission is
to provide education to children in Punjab. For this purpose, she has created a charity ‘Kirtan for Causes’.
Thus, wherever she performs Kirtan the collection for that goes for the said charity. She donates this amount
to an NGO ‘Baba Sahib Organisation’ that works for child education and women empowerment in Punjab.
It may be clarified here that her father S. Jatinder Singh Uppal living in Australia has also been serving the
humanity by educating the children in Punjab (around 500 children have been adopted for this purpose).
She was recently honored at the Sikh Award 2016 function at Park Plaza Hotel, London. As she is still very
young we have big hopes from such a role model, whose following words inspire all of us “I have been
blessed with a very comfortable life, but I feel that I must do something for those less fortunate than me. And
I honestly believe that if each of us can look out for others a little bit more – feed an orphan, donate some
clothing to the needy, educate the poor, etc., the world would be a much better place to live in.”
