The Centre on Friday directed the Haryana Governor to withdraw the assent granted to a Bill aiming to create a separate Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee, saying the State Assembly did not have the legal authority to enact such a law and it was thus ‘void’.
The Centre’s action came after protests on the issue in Punjab and State Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, along with party MPs, had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Ministers Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley and M Venkaiah Naidu seeking the Centre’s intervention to annul the Haryana Government’s move to form a separate SGPC for the State.
In a letter to Haryana Chief Secretary S C Choudhary, Union Home Secretary Anil Goswami said the ‘Haryana Sikh Gurdwaras (Management) Bill, 2014’ passed by the State Assembly on July 11, to which the Governor accorded his assent on July 14, has “no legal effect” and be withdrawn before any further complications arise.
“Accordingly, the State Government of Haryana may kindly bring the above facts to the notice of the Governor and request the Governor to withdraw the assent given by him to the Bill in view of the fact that the State legislature had no legislative competence and the Bill passed is void and of no legal effect before any or further complications arise,” Goswami said in his letter to Choudhary.
After the long deliberations with Badal, the Centre had sought legal opinion from the Attorney General who opined that Haryana State legislature had no jurisdiction to pass such a law. The Punjab Government has been maintaining that the Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC) which manages key Sikh shrines, was formed under the Central Gurdwara Act, 1925, during the British times and Haryana had no legal authority to enact a law for separate SGPC to manage Gurdwaras in the State.
Badal has termed the Haryana law as “politically motivated” and said it is aimed at getting the ruling Congress in the State led by Bhupinder Singh Hooda political benefits in the coming Assembly elections in the state. Haryana is slated to have Assembly elections in October this year as the term of the current Assembly ends on October 27, 2014.
Badal has also accused Congress leadership of hatching a conspiracy to create a separate SGPC for Haryana, saying it is “unconstitutional” and in “violation” of the existing Sikh Gurdwara Act.