Today in Politics: PM Modi to mark IMD’s 150th foundation day; jailed Punjab MP Amritpal Singh to launch party

To celebrate the IMD’s 150th foundation day, a series of events, activities and workshops have been organised to showcase its achievements, its role in making India climate-resilient and demonstrate the role played by the government institutions in providing various weather and climate services.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the national capital, Delhi CM Atishi is scheduled to file her nomination papers on Tuesday for the forthcoming Assembly polls. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA, who is contesting to retain her Kalkaji Assembly seat against the BJP’s former South Delhi MP Ramesh Bidhuri and Congress’s ex-MLA Alka Lamba, was initially scheduled to file her nomination on Monday, but was delayed during her roadshow. So far, the AAP is the only major party to declare candidates on all of Delhi’s 70 Assembly seats, with the BJP and Congress still to announce some of their nominees.

Politics and Maghi Mela in Punjab

On Tuesday, in Punjab’s Sri Muktsar Sahib, the annual Maghi Mela is being held to honour Sikhs killed in the 1705 Battle of Muktsar against the Mughals. Though it is among the state’s most notable religious events, over the years, political conferences became the main attraction in this mela, and often set the political tone for the state. Since 2018, however, there have been attempts to reduce the number of conferences and de-politicise the festival.

But among the major political attractions at this year’s mela is the expected launch of pro-Khalistan leader and Khadoor Sahib MP Amritpal Singh’s new political party, as reported by Kamaldeep Singh Brar.

With Amritpal in detention under the National Security Act (NSA) in Assam’s Dibrugarh jail, from where he contested and won the Lok Sabha polls as an Independent, his father Tarsem Singh, along with the son of one of Indira Gandhi’s assassins and Faridkot MP Sarabjit Singh Khalsa, will be organising the “Panth Bachao, Punjab Bachao (Save the Panth, Save Punjab)” rally on January 14. They will also announce an organisational committee to help lay the groundwork for the new party.

The new party’s launch comes at a time when the waning fortunes of the Sukhbir Badal-led Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) have created a political vacuum in the state, particularly among Sikhs.

The Akali Dal has been unable to recover from its dented image among the Sikhs since the 2015 sacrilege case. Recently, the Akal Takht – one of the five Sikh seats of power – punished former party chief Sukhbir Badal for “violation of the Sikh code” during his stint as the deputy chief minister from 2007 to 2017, forced him to resign as party chief and ordered a reorganisation of the party leadership.

The Lok Sabha victories of Amritpal and Khalsa showed that they were able to draw support from the Akali Dal’s Sikh vote bank. However, with Amritpal in jail, they will likely face additional challenges as a new party to convince the public they are a viable alternative to the Akali Dal. Amritpal has now been in jail since March 2023, with his custody extended for another year in June 2024.

But despite its recent troubles, the SAD is expected to have a presence at the mela, though other parties including the ruling AAP and Congress are likely to stay away.

– With PTI inputs