The row over separate SGPC for Haryana took another turn on Saturday with the ruling Shiromani Akali Dal in Punjab deciding to hold what it called a “massive” Panthic conference of Sikhs from all over the world at Amritsar on July 27 to chalk out a strategy following the carving out of a separate body to manage the gurdwaras in Haryana.
The decision was taken in the emergency meeting of the core committee of the SAD, held at the residence of Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal here.The core committee of SAD decided to hold the Panthic Conference at 10.00 am on July 27 at Manji Hall in Darbar Sahib, Amritsar to chalk out the programme to fight what it called “the assault on Sikh religion, religious institutions and the Sikh Gurdwara Act 1925, by the Congress Government in Haryana headed by Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda at the behest of the Congress president Sonia Gandhi.”
The marathon meeting of the SAD core committee started at 11.00 am and lasted for five hours. Given the sensitivity of the issue, it discussed the entire chain of events leading to the passage of the Bill in Haryana Assembly and the efforts taken after the Bill became an Act following gubernatorial assent.After the meeting, SAD General Secretary Harcharan Singh Bains said that an attack on Sikh religion and its sacred institutions will never be tolerated.
The party expressed satisfaction over the action taken by the Government of India so far. The core committee also asked the Union Government to follow up its action of declaring the Haryana Act unconstitutional with appropriate follow up steps to make it null and void, as it was a clear breach of the Constitution of India.Bains said a meeting of SAD office bearers, SGPC members and representatives from all over the country will be held at the SAD headquarters in Chandigarh on July 22.
“The Khalsa Panth will never tolerate interference in its religious affairs. The Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda is on a disastrous course of confrontation with the Khalsa Panth. He thinks he can repeat the blunder of the British Government and hand over the management of sacred shrines to his favourite Mahants and Masands,” said Harcharan Bains. He said that the core committee warned the Haryana Chief Minster against persisting with its interference in Sikh religious affairs and to stop trying to sow divisions in the Panth.
The core committee said Hooda was mistaken in believing that Haryana Sikhs were in any way separate or different from the greater Panthic mainstream. “They owe their blood lineage to Dasmesh Pita Gur Gobind Singh. Hooda was wrong in believing that the Haryana Sikhs were committed to his Congress Government. The Haryana Sikhs, like their brethren all over the world, are committed to Guru Granth Sahib and Sri Akal Takht Sahib. They and their ancestors made the greatest sacrifices to get the Sikh Gurdwara Act enacted in 1925 under which the SGPC was set up,” the statement of the Core Committee said.
The Core committee expressed shock that the Haryana government had declared the Sikh gurdwaras as government property under the companies Act. “The sacred offerings of the Sikh devotees before Guru Granth Sahib will now become government’s revenue. It is not the Panthic representatives but hand-picked Masands of the Haryana Government who are being asked to manage the sacred Sikh shrines. These Masands will now become employees of the Haryana Government and will receive their salaries from the state treasury,” said the Core Committee resolution.
It said the issue did not concern the Haryana Government but the Khalsa Panth. And constitutionally also, it did not lie with the jurisdiction of the Haryana Government.