Here's my
@Telegraph column, 'Reform is wrong: The Sikh kirpan must not be banned'
telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06…
The murder of Henry Nowak has, rightly, led to a huge public debate. The police’s decision to arrest and handcuff Nowak as he lay dying because his murderer claimed to have been racially abused appears to be the latest, albeit the most grotesque, example of woke policing destroying the trust we once had in the constabulary.
But the case has now pushed another debate to the fore. Nowak’s murderer, Vickrum Digwa, is a Sikh. And he stabbed Nowak with a 21cm blade which he claimed was a kirpan – the ceremonial sword carried by Sikhs as one of their Five Ks, which symbolise Sikhs’ fundamental belief in the protection of the weak and defence of their faith.
As a result, some MPs have called for the kirpan to be banned and Reform UK has pledged to remove the legal exemption which allows Sikhs to carry a kirpan with them in public. Zia Yusuf, its home affairs spokesman, says: “I don’t care what religion you are. NOBODY other than law enforcement will get to carry deadly weapons under a Reform government. Reform will repeal the exemption for Sikhs to carry the kirpan. We will deploy stop and search and get deadly weapons off our streets.”
On the face of it, it seems a reasonable response. Why should Sikhs be permitted to roam the streets with a deadly weapon which would be banned if handled by anyone else?
But as with so much reporting around religious and criminal issues, the entire row is based on a faulty premise. Digwa was carrying a dangerous weapon which was indeed banned. It was not a kirpan and it had no exemption. Digwa claimed it was a kirpan precisely because he was in the habit of keeping and wandering the streets with deadly knives which were banned. It was as much of a lie as his claim that Nowak racially abused him.
The large ceremonial weapons that are sometimes pictured alongside articles about Sikhs – one of which Digwa used to murder Nowak – are already banned on the streets. Digwa was carrying a pesh-kabz, which was used historically by Sikh warriors to pierce armour. It has never been given an exemption to the law, nor would any Sikh want such an exemption.
Digwa wore a genuine, tiny kirpan under his clothes, which remained there throughout his murderous assault. The fact he was a Sikh is entirely irrelevant to what happened as a result of his being on the streets with a 21cm blade. He was breaking the law, as would be anyone else of any or no religion.
Since the exemption was first introduced in the Criminal Justice Act 1988 and then reinforced by the Offensive Weapons Act 2019, there has not been a single example of a kirpan being used in either a killing or an attack. Of course not: the kirpans carried by Sikhs today are usually more like tiny pieces of jewellery, often on a necklace. They are no more a potential murder weapon than any other pendant.
It would be a terrible injustice to Sikhs if their religious freedoms were destroyed by the toxic combination of the actions of one Sikh who was indeed a murderer, followed by the hue and cry since Nowak’s murder – based on the ignorance of MPs, politicians and the media, which conflates small, symbolic kirpans with larger-bladed weapons which are already banned.
If the motives of Zia Yusuf and MPs who have joined him in calling for the kirpan to be banned are decent, they will realise that they have misunderstood what happened and drop their demand. If, however, they continue to call for a ban, it will be clear that their real motive is to use Sikhs for their own political ends.