Bibi Jagir Kaur triggers churning in Panthic domain with decision to contest SGPC presidential poll

 

Bibi Jagir Kaur triggers churning in Panthic domain with decision to contest SGPC presidential poll

Ground Zero

Jagtar Singh

 

Bibi Jagir Kaur, who has announced her candidature for election to the office of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee while exercising her democratic right, today set the short-term and long term Panthic agenda for the revival of the highest institutions of Akal Takht and the apex elected body of the Sikhs that used to dictate religio-political affairs of the Sikhs at one time.

The Akal Takht, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee and the Shiromani Akali Dal are the  three main components that are considered to comprise the Panthic matrix that is religio-political. At one level, the Shiromani Akali Dal used to draw its strength from the other two main institutions.

However, the institution of Akal Takht and the SGPC stand degenerated during the last more than one decade.

And the Akali Dal, repeatedly rejected by the people in Punjab, is fighting its existentialist battle.

It is under such a situation that Bibi Jagir Kaur, who earlier headed the SGPC multiple times and has the distinction of its being the first ever woman president, has come out to the forefront to throw her hat in the annual election to its presidency claiming it her democratic right, the right that has been questioned by her party.

Fore about two decades, the practice has been that the members of the general house of the SGPC from the Akali Dal would authorise the party president to finalise the name of the president and other members of the executive committee that would be announced during the election meeting.

This is what came to be known as the ‘Lifafa Culture’.

Bibi Jagir Kaur has now dictated party president Sukhbir Singh Badal to announce the candidate days ahead of the poll and his choice is renomination of Harjinder Singh Dhami. Bibi Jagir Kaur is already facing disciplinary action.

She today went ahead and formally announced her candidature while releasing the agenda.

She talked of restoring the autonomy of  this elected statutory mini-parliament of the Sikhs and thereby intensify the Panthic activity. “It is my first promise with the Sikh Panth that given the chance to serve, the autonomous and independent status of  the SGPC would be restored”, she said.

The credibility of both the SGPC and the Akal Takht nosedived especially during the Bargari sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib and firing on Sikh devotees demanding justice during the Akal Dal government.

There has been no regret from the political leadership.

Bargari is one of the main factors that pushed the Akali Dal to the margins but there is no indication that this has been realised by the party leadership that in effect is Badal and Badal.

It is in this context that the challenge posed by Bibi Jagir Kaur, once a strong loyalist of the Badal family, has to be assessed.

The leadership of Sukhbir Singh Badal has been under attack since the party was reduced to just three seats in the last Assembly election. The worst the party faced was its performance in the Sangrur Lok Sabha by-election in which the party was pushed down to the fifth place, even below its erstwhile alliance partner the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Badal Junior has so far managed to  frustrate challenge to his leadership of this completely marginalised party. The problem is that other senior leaders lack unanimity on a new leader.

Bibi Jagir Kaur today set the agenda that the people have been otherwise talking about in the Panthic domain and these are the very issues that have been relegated to the background.

As she was releasing her agenda, the Akali Dal served yet another ultimatum on her till tomorrow noon.

The issue is not the notice issued to her by the disciplinary action committee whose very existence she has questioned.

It is the churning in the religio-political domain that has been sparked by her candidature that is multi-dimensional in the context of the situation in the party since the successive humiliating defeats posing challenge to its very existence.

The party has  several senior leaders who are fence-sitters as they favour change at the top but can’t take the decisive step.

Here is the time for them to act and act decisively.

The issue is not victory or defeat of Bibi Jagir Kaur but the issues that she has precipitated and the bold challenge to the Badals.

The churning beneath the surface could play crucial role in the presidential election that otherwise used to be routine.

This election is going to have long term impact on the Akali Dal.