Indian-born Gurmeet Singh Sidhu, who won the Movember UK and Europe Award 2025 in the \u201cGoing the Distance\u201d category after travelling 508 km, has now completed a 710 km walking challenge to raise awareness for men\u2019s mental health and suicide prevention.<\/p>\n
Hailing from Bir Behman, Bathinda, Sidhu \u2014 known as Walking Singh \u2014 is an alumnus of The Punjab Public School, Nabha. A teacher at Gravesend Grammar School, he told The Tribune that his original target was 600 km \u2014 symbolising the 60 men who die by suicide every hour worldwide, one every minute.<\/p>\n
\u201cI pushed past 710 km, raising nearly \u00a33,000 for the Movember charity,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Sidhu said men face serious mental health issues because they often don\u2019t open up and keep their emotions to themselves. \u201cI carry the values of resilience and togetherness that our Punjabi culture teaches us. Yet, resilience does not mean silence. Too many Punjabi men, like those in other communities, suffer quietly, believing they must bear every burden alone. This walk was a reminder that mental health is not a weakness, and seeking help is an act of strength,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He added that by opening conversations and breaking long-held stigmas, \u201cwe can save lives and ensure that no one in our community feels they must struggle in isolation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sidhu\u2019s feat has brought pride to the Punjabi community. Last year, after recovering from a spinal injury, he walked 500 km for the Movember charity and earned the UK and Europe \u201cGoing the Distance\u201d award for his dedication to men\u2019s health and as a role model for young people. This year\u2019s challenge carried deeper emotional weight \u2014 he had watched close family friends lose their daughter, who was the same age as his eldest son. Throughout his teaching career, he has seen too many promising young lives cut short.<\/p>\n
Over 30 days, Sidhu walked 30 long routes, covering an average of 24 km a day \u2014 all while teaching full-time. Some mornings began at 3 am before school, and some nights ended at 3 am instead. His knees ached, calves throbbed, and blisters were unavoidable. Cold winds, heavy rain, and fatigue were constant companions \u2014 and yet he kept going. Because, as he says, \u201cso many people \u2014 especially young men \u2014 are hurting quietly. Some don\u2019t speak. Some can\u2019t. Some don\u2019t know how.\u201d<\/p>\n
As per UK media reports, Louie French, Shadow Minister for Culture, Media and Sport, has invited Sidhu to the Houses of Parliament to discuss suicide prevention and the urgent need to prioritise men\u2019s health.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Indian-born Gurmeet Singh Sidhu, who won the Movember UK and Europe Award 2025 in the \u201cGoing the Distance\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":330303,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[102,1906,6623,56,54,55,128902],"class_list":{"0":"post-330302","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mental-health","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-mental-health","10":"tag-mentalhealth","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom","13":"tag-unitedkingdom","14":"tag-walking-singh"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330302\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/330303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}