Soon after the victory of Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) in the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) elections, an euphoric party president, Sukhbir Singh Badal said the victory was proof of the complete rejection of both AAP and the Congress amongst the Sikh community
Voting for the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) was held on February 26. SAD candidates won around 75 per cent of the 46 seats in the DSGMC.
DSGMC President Manjit Singh GK and senior leader Manjinder Singh Sirsa were among the winners. Shiromani Akali Dal (Delhi) President Paramjit Singh Sarna, supported by the Congress, was among the prominent losers. He lost to Sirsa for the Punjabi Bagh seat.
Reacting to the victory, Punjab Chief Minister and Chief Patron of the Shiromani Akali Dal Parkash Singh Badal described the results as “a triumph of Seva over sponsored seekers of power through falsehood and sensationalism. It is a massive victory of the Sikh quam achieved with the blessings of Sri Guru Granth Sahib against those who have always sided with the enemies of the Panth and betrayed the community for petty selfish gains.”
“The Khalsa Panth has demonstrated complete endorsement of the manner in which the party’s workers and leaders have been engaged in serving the cause of the Khalsa Panth and in spreading the great and eternal message of the sacred Gurbani and also putting it into practice through tireless Seva (service of mankind),” said the Chief Minister.
‘The mandate is also an unequivocal endorsement of the party’s approach towards and handling of crucial Sikh issues by the party,’ he said.
In a statement here, Badal further said “The Khalsa Panth has exposed and routed vicious attempts to cause religious and ideological confusion in the minds of the Sikh masses.” Mr. Badal said that deep rooted conspiracies were at play to sow seeds of disunity and confusion in the ranks of the community with the objective of weakening it and dilute the spiritual strength which Sikhs have always drawn from the established institutions of the community. The Sikh Sangat has delivered a strong and categorical rebuff to all such conspirators who had been recklessly spreading misinformation in the community to kill its traditional reservoirs of moral and spiritual strength,” said Badal.
In a separate statement, the SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal described the poll outcome as “victory of Khalsa Panth over the old and new enemies of the Sikh masses. “This is powerful and befitting reply from the community to the vicious and mischievous campaign of falsehood spread by a handful of self-centered elements operating under various disguises. The mandate is also an unequivocal endorsement of the party’s approach towards and handling of crucial Sikh issues by the party.”
The SAD president said that the results would prove to be “just a curtain raiser to the results of the Punjab poll.”
The Deputy Chief Minister said that the enormity of the mandate has filled him and the entire leadership of the party with an “even greater sense of humility, commitment and dedication to the Panthic ideals and to the spread of the message of the great Gurus through globalization of the process of this spread.”
“The Khalsa Panth has shown once again that no one can ever succeed in cutting the moral and spiritual sources from where the Sikhs constantly and eternally maintain their ‘live’ bond with the great Gurus through the sacred Gurbani,” said Sukhbir.