Nearly 41 years on, HC verdict on Dera Baba Gandha Singh of Barnala

It took 41 years for the Punjab and Haryana High Court to decide one of its oldest pending cases “in entirety” and to conclude that Dera Baba Gandha Singh of Barnala in Sangrur district of Punjab is a Nirmala Sadhu Dera and not a Sikh gurdwara as claimed by the SGPC.

The dera has around 2,000 acres in Barnala, Dhuri and Patiala. After the Sikh Gurdwara Act, 1925, was enacted, the SGPC had begun to take over the management of various gurdwaras and deras but many dera mahants had resisted its move.

The division bench, comprising justices Mahesh Grover and Shekher Dhawan, has now set aside Sikh Gurdwara Tribunal’s order dated July 11,1975, and said that the tribunal was wrong in recording the Nirmala Sadhu Dera to be a Sikh gurdwara.