Newsmaker | Ex-SGPC president Bibi Jagir Kaur returns to take on Badals, seven months after expulsion from Akali Dal

In the election, SAD candidate Harjinder Singh Dhami was re-elected as the SGPC president as he defeated challenger Jagir Kaur.

In February this year, Kaur called a meeting where participants spoke of ousting the Badals from the SAD to save the party.

In her address after her announcement of the Panth board Saturday, Kaur reiterated her views. “In 1920s, the SGPC got freed the gurdwaras from the control of the Mahants. Now the time has come to make the SGPC free from the excessive political interference,” she said, refraining from naming the Sukhbir Badal’s family. She, however, charged that the SAD leaders have embarrassed the Sikh community on many occasions with their decisions on issues pertaining to the community.

Kaur’s move again cast a spotlight on the demand for a leadership change in the SAD despite the Badal family’s attempts to maintain their grip on the party and the SGPC.

In her 25-year political career, Kaur has been a Cabinet minister and the first woman SGPC president. She was

known for her leadership skills during her tenure as the leader of the apex Sikh elected body. She has also remained embroiled in various controversies.

Teacher to SGPC chief

Kaur holds a Bachelor’s degrees in science and education and worked as a teacher. In 1987, she quit her job after she was appointed head of the Dera of Baba Prem Singh Murale Wale. The Dera has a significant following in Kapurthala district’s Bholath constituency, mainly among the Lubana community to which she belongs. Kaur later represented this constituency in the Assembly.

Kaur’s position as the Dera head helped her in joining the SAD before the 1997 Assembly elections in Punjab. The then party chief Parkash Singh Badal decided to field her from Bholath against Sukhpal Singh Khaira, son of firebrand Akali politician and ex-minister Sukhjinder Singh. Khaira, a Congress candidate, lost to Kaur by a big margin. Kaur’s victory helped the first-time MLA gain a Cabinet berth in the government. She won the same seat again in 2002 and 2012.

However, Kaur’s election as the SGPC chief saw the Sikh community divided over the Nanakshahi calendar, with the then Akal Takht Jathedar Puran Singh and Bibi Jagir Kaur representing the two camps. While the SGPC celebrated Guru Gobind Singh’s birth anniversary on January 5, 2000, the Akal Takht observed it two years later, on January 14, 2002.

The battlelines between Kaur and Singh were drawn, with many expecting she would use her authority to remove the Jathedar from the post. Preempting such a move, Singh issued an “edict” on January 25, 2000 to “excommunicate” Kaur from the community and ordered her to appear before the Akal Takht.

As her rivals sensed an opportunity to topple her, a combative Kaur finally succeeded in getting Singh removed as the Akal Takht Jathedar.

There is an unwritten convention that women don’t perform kirtan at the Golden Temple. While the community had been debating the issue for long, Kaur favoured breaking this convention and allowing women to sing there.

As the SGPC president, Kaur issued an advertisement in newspapers asking Sikh women who could sing gurbani hymns to contact the body. However, no Sikh woman reportedly responded to the advertisement, with many of them publicly opposing any tampering with the traditions.

A former loyalist of Badals, Kaur’s early success in politics was overshadowed by her daughter’s death case.

In an ironic development for the first SGPC woman president who stood for women’s rights, Kaur was accused of killing her daughter in 2000. Many said it was a case of honour killing ordered by Kaur, who in 2012 was convicted by a CBI court for abduction and forced abortion of her daughter, and jailed for five years.

The conviction was a setback to Kaur’s image and political career. She lost the SGPC presidency, while the SAD also did not offer her any major post, retaining her only as the president of the party’s women wing. The Punjab and Haryana High Court, however, acquitted her of all charges in her daughter’s death case in December 2018.