Gurdwaras in Australiaਆਸਟਰੇਲੀਆ ਦੇ ਗੁਰਦੁਆਰੇ

Gurdwaras in Australia are the Sikh temples of a community of 210,400 people counted in the 2021 census, 0.83 percent of the population and the country's fifth largest religious group. Their story begins not in a great city but in the banana town of Woolgoolga in New South Wales, where the First Sikh Temple opened in June 1968 as the first gurdwara in Australia, and it now runs to the big suburban temples of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth.

What are the gurdwaras of Australia?

A gurdwara is the Sikh place of worship, literally the doorway to the Guru. Its prayer hall centres on the Guru Granth Sahib Ji, the Sikh scripture honoured as the eternal Guru, and every gurdwara runs a langar, a free vegetarian kitchen open to everyone regardless of faith, status or background. In Australia the gurdwara is also the community's anchor: Punjabi school, sports club, wedding hall and meeting place, built and run by the local sangat, the congregation, through donations and voluntary seva, selfless service.

How did Sikhs first come to Australia?

It is hard to separate the first Sikh arrivals from the wider story of Indians in early Australia. Sikhs appear to have arrived from the late 1830s, working as farm labourers on cane fields and shepherds on sheep stations, and some adventurers followed during the gold rush of the 1850s. From the 1860s, cameleers brought to explore and settle the arid interior, commonly called Ghans, included a sizeable minority of Sikhs from Punjab. Towards the end of the century Sikh hawkers, travelling from farm to farm selling goods, became a familiar sight in country districts; two of the most successful, Baba Ram Singh and Otim Singh, established The People Stores in 1907, and Baba Ram Singh is thought to have brought the first Guru Granth Sahib to Australia in the early 1920s.

The White Australia years and the Woolgoolga community

From federation in 1901 until 1973, the White Australia policy restricted the immigration of non white people, including Sikhs, and the community stayed small. During the Second World War, labour shortages opened the banana industry to Indian workers, and Sikhs migrated to Woolgoolga on the New South Wales north coast to fill the shortage, forming a community that exists to this day. In the 1950s and 1960s those men bought land, started their own banana farms and brought their wives from Punjab; by 1961 there were six Sikh women in Woolgoolga, and the first true Sikh Australian families had begun.

Woolgoolga: where Australian gurdwaras began

In 1965 a committee of Sikh and Australian members formed to build Woolgoolga a gurdwara. Land was bought on Hastings Street in 1967, building began that July, and the First Sikh Temple opened for worship in June 1968, a modest brick and tile building in the Australian style, with the Guru Granth Sahib Ji installed and read by a female granthi, and the Nishan Sahib, the Sikh flag, raised at its entrance. A split in the community led to a second Woolgoolga gurdwara, the Guru Nanak Temple in River Street, in 1970. The First Sikh Temple is now of state heritage significance as the first Sikh gurdwara built in New South Wales and Australia, and in 2019 a new, traditionally styled gurdwara opened beside it, the two together telling the story of the community's beginnings, growth and pride.

Growth after 1973

With the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Sikh migration to Australia increased dramatically. Most Australian Sikhs trace their heritage to Punjab, but many have come from Malaysia, Singapore, Fiji, Kenya, Uganda and the United Kingdom among other countries. Where the early settlers worked the land in country districts, the new migrants settled mainly around the major cities. The 2021 census counted 91,745 Sikhs in Victoria, which now has the largest Sikh population, 47,165 in New South Wales, 27,713 in Queensland, 18,583 in Western Australia and 17,259 in South Australia, and Sikhism is described as the country's fastest growing religion.

All Gurdwaras in Australia

First Sikh Temple, Woolgoolga - the first gurdwara built in Australia, opened in June 1968, standing beside its 2019 successor on Hastings Street

Gurdwara Sahib, Glenwood - Sydney's Sikh Centre on Meurants Lane, run by the Australian Sikh Association, drawing 5,000 to 10,000 worshippers a week

Sri Guru Singh Sabha Gurdwara, Revesby - Sydney's first gurdwara, founded in 1976 and opened in 1978 on The River Road, with its Punjabi School

Brisbane Sikh Temple, Eight Mile Plains - the first gurdwara in South East Queensland, on Logan Road since December 1988

Individual entries for Australia's best known gurdwaras are added to this guide one by one, and each is linked here as it is published. Still to come: the Sikh Gurdwara Perth at Bennett Springs, the principal gurdwara of Western Australia.

Langar, nagar kirtans and community life

Across Australia, gurdwaras mark the year's great days, above all Vaisakhi, which recalls the founding of the Khalsa in 1699, and the Gurpurabs of the Gurus, with prayer, kirtan and, in the larger cities, nagar kirtan processions through the streets. Between festivals the work is seva: langar kitchens feeding anyone who comes, Punjabi and music classes for Australian born children, and support for neighbours in hard times, from bushfire and flood relief to food for the homeless. For a community whose first temple rose beside banana farms, the gurdwara remains the place where Punjab and Australia meet.

Visiting a gurdwara in Australia

You do not need to be Sikh, to book, or to pay. Cover your head, remove your shoes, and sit on the floor of the prayer hall for as long as you wish; when the service ends, stay for langar, the free vegetarian meal served to all. Weekends and festival days are the busiest and most welcoming times for a first visit. A trip to Woolgoolga, where the first temple of 1968 and its 2019 successor stand side by side, is the essential pilgrimage of Sikh Australia.

What was the first gurdwara in Australia?

The first gurdwara in Australia was the First Sikh Temple at Woolgoolga, New South Wales, opened in June 1968 by the town's Sikh banana farming community. A second Woolgoolga gurdwara followed in 1970, and the original temple is now recognised as a place of state heritage significance.

How many Sikhs live in Australia?

The 2021 census counted 210,400 Sikhs in Australia, 0.83 percent of the population, making Sikhism the country's fifth largest religious group. The largest communities are in Victoria, with 91,745 Sikhs, followed by New South Wales with 47,165 and Queensland with 27,713.