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Resurrection of Akali Dal not possible without complete overhaul, beginning from top


 

Comatose Akali Dal needs intensive surgery for revival beginning from top

Ground Zero

Jagtar Singh

Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal today set up a 16-member committee to recommend measures for the rejuvenation of the historic Shiromani Akali Dal.

As per the party readout, the mandate is to “recommend sweeping changes to safeguard the core principles of the party.”

He said, “The Committee would introspect on the recent assembly election results and take feedback from the grass root level on the steps needed to strengthen the party…. the Committee would also suggest changes needed at the organizational level.”

However, the situation confronting this once party of the Sikhs is unprecedented in this more than a century old Akali Dal and somewhat different from the oldest party in the country that is the Congress. Akali Dal is the second oldest. Both the Congress and the Akali Dal have been subjected to humiliating defeat.

However, in case of Shiromani Akali Dal, it is not just defeat but decimation, having been reduced to just three seats in the Assembly having 117 members.

Both its Patron and the President too have lost.

It was anticipated that Sukhbir Singh Badal would own moral responsibility for this decimation and quit, the second under his command, leaving aside Parliamentary polls.

However, his father and party Patron Parkash Singh Badal intervened in the core committee meeting that he attended after a long time to save his son saying the defeat was just routine and the party had faced a similar situation earlier in 1989 Lok Sabha elections. These two elections are not comparable as the Akali Dal was marginalized by the radical Sikh leaders in 1989, not any other party.

The decimation is the result of a long process rooted in 1996 when the party consciously drifted away from its core that used to be the Panth and opted for Punjabiat at its 75th anniversary conference at Moga. There was something deeper in this shift. The Indian State was emphasizing on Punjabiat at that time as part of the policy to counter radical discourse in this border state.

Over the years, it was this shift that produced the tragedy of Bargari sacrilege in 2015 under the Badal government. This tragedy was compounded as both father and son started ridiculing and confronting the Sikh devotees demanding justice for the sacrilege and related incidents including police firing at Behbal. This was witnessed even in 2018 when protest was started at Bargari on June 1, 2018 demanding justice. This tragedy is still to witness closure.

The Badals have never even regretted for the Bargari sacrilege tragedy. Not that they were responsible for it but for different reasons. Badal Senior was instrumental in facilitating exoneration of Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmit Ram Rahim from the highest Sikh clergy. It is this dera that is the accused in Bargari sacrilege.

The Sikhs turned against the Shiromani Akali Dal in the religio-political domain. It is this domain that used to be the core of the Shiromani Akali Dal for decades.

In the process, Akal Takht and Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee were adversely hit as both these highest Sikh institutions were misused by to defend such anti-Sikh actions. The credibility of both these institutions is now at the lowest. SGPC which is an elected statutory body is controlled by the Akali Dal.

The corporate model that Sukhbir Singh Badal introduced in the SGPC created havoc over the years and it has become as corrupt a body as any government department.

This model is the same as introduced by him in the Shiromani Akali Dal.

The party has been turned into corporate entity based upon partnership that is controlled by a group  whose members represent various interest groups, not in political domain but in business. The second dimension is the family control leaving virtually no space for party activists. This party used to be open and democratic in its functioning. Now it is access-controlled party, cut off from its own roots.

It is in this context that the 16-member committee won’t be able to recommend drastic changes that are called for.

It has already been realized that the worst is still to come and that is the election to the general house of the SGPC that has historically been the Akali Dal domain. Alert has been sounded by Badal Senior himself. The party has already lost control over the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee.

It is time for leaders to show moral courage for the revival of this party whose resurrection is now all the more needed when the Sikhs have turned global. The irony is its leaders can’t even visit countries like Canada and USA for fear of the Sikh anger overseas against them.

It is time for both Badals to make sacrifice for the cause of the Shiromani Akali Dal and also the two other Sikh institutions.

The entire Sikh leadership in the religio-political domain must apologise at Akal Takht for the what can be termed as sins committed over the years, the first being the withdrawal of blasphemy case against Ram Rahim five days before Assembly election in 2012. This apology should follow after Badals resigns as patron and party president. The SGPC chief and the Akal Takht Jathedar should seek forgiveness for turning these two institutions as instruments of the vested interests over the years. The issue is that of institutions, not just the individuals.

A meeting of the party’s general house should be summoned at Amritsar to take emergency measures. Let collective leadership in true Sikh tradition take over till the recommendations made by the 16-member committee after which the election should be held to elect the new president, even if he happens to be Sukhbir Singh Badal.

Resurrection of Shiromani Akali Dal is a must for Sikhs and Punjab under whatever leadership.

 

 

 

 

 

 


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