Untimely election campaigns to grab power in Punjab can hit farm struggle for survival, revive groupism in villages

 

Untimely election campaigns to grab power in Punjab can hit farm struggle for survival

Ground Zero

Jagtar Singh

 

The issue here is not whether the angry farmers who are confronting the election campaigns are agents or not of the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party as alleged by Akali Dal President Sukhbir Singh Badal.

The concern here is about the impact of this confrontation that has sharpened with the launching of 100-day campaign by Mr. Badal to mobilise people for February 2022 elections.

This confrontation took aggressive form at Moga today where the Akali supporters clashed with the agitating farmers and police resorted to mild lathi charge against protesters near the venue of the Akali conference.

One of the most positive dimensions of the farm struggle is the end to grouping and factionalism in the countryside.

This confrontation can adversely impact this newly developed social harmony thereby weakening the farm stir. The farm struggle must remain united at the grassroots.

The weakening of the farm struggle in Punjab and that too due to the power hungry political leaders would benefit only the Narendra Modi government.

This was not the time to launch such intensive election campaign. This campaign of Akali Dal is ill-timed as the election is due only in February 2022.

This could harm the Akali Dal prospects too at the time when the ruling Congress is engaged in fight to finish inner party power struggle and has no time to focus on the election campaign. And AAP is in total disarray presently.

The Akalis are accusing the protesters of being instruments of the Congress and AAP.

One has to go back to history on this accusation. AAP is the recent addition in this narrative.

Then Chief Minister  and Akali Dal president Parkash Singh Badal accused the stalwart Jathedar Gurcharan Singh Tohra after the split in the party in 1999 as being the Congress agent. This was the only charge that he levelled against the man who was the last from the Panthic fold and who lorded over the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee for more than a quarter of a century.

Tohra is the man whose name would go into history for his notable contribution to the Sikh religio-political matrix as against Mr Badal who has only the record of being 5-time chief minister to his credit and the blot of Bargari sacrilege in the Panthic domain.

The use of Panthic idiom ended with the passing away of Jathedar Tohra.

The face of the Akali Dal has now changed. Now Jai Shri Ram is raised from the Akali Dal stage not by any worker but by the president himself.

One should study the pictures of the motorcycle riders leading the convoys of Sukhbir Singh Badal to get insight into changing face of this once Panthic party.

Jathedar Tohra ceased to be the Congress agent for Mr Badal after the two re-united in 2003 after the Akali Dal lost the 2002 Assembly election to the Congress due to the split.

This accusation of being the Congress agent seems to be the only weapon in the armoury of the House of Badals against opponents.

The Akali Dal used to represent Panth and the farmers.

The situation has now changed.

The Shiromani Akali Dal now represents neither the Panth nor the farmers and has been reduced to just an ordinary party whose only agenda of to grab power.

That this party still controls the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee is a different issue.

The Bargari sacrilege in 2015 under Parkash Singh Badal government alienated it from the Panthic domain. Ironically, the party leadership has refused to make amends.

It may be recalled that the Badals had made similar accusations against the Sikh protesters seeking justice for sacrilege and Behbal Kalan police firing.

At the time when the farmers launched their struggle against the farm bills implemented  through ordinances last year, the Badals took the line that those protesters were not even farmers. All this is part of the record.

The Akali Dal which was then part of the Narendra Modi government was vociferously defending the three controversial laws.

The Kirti Kisan Union has rebutted the charge of being Congress and AAP agents levelled by Mr Badal.

The union leaders are on the record maintaining that the election campaigns launched by the political parties would harm the farm struggle. This union has been joined by several other kisan bodies in confronting the election campaigns.

The farmers are confronting political leaders from every political party in the villages but it is only the Akali Dal that has launched its formal poll campaign.

 The call by the SKM, the umbrella organisation leading the struggle, is to block political activity of the BJP and only question other political parties in Punjab. These protesters have been questioning the Akali leaders but the situation is heading towards confrontation.

As the farmers are mainly the Sikhs in Punjab, the questions that are being raised now also include sacrilege and the controversial power purchased agreements signed by the Badal government that are loaded against consumers and not just the role of the Akali Dal on farm bills before the party came out of alliance with the BJP under pressure.

If the confrontation has the potential to weaken the support base of the farmers in Punjab by dividing them, it can hit the prospects of the Akali Dal too when the AAP is lost and the Congress is victim of fierce factionalism.

The farm struggle is now turning into mass struggle as the new model would hit the consumers too when the food trade is monopolised by the corporates.

Are political campaigns more important that the struggle for survival? The power seekers must address this question.