Sidhu Moose Wala statue: What a Haryana leader’s salute to a Punjab icon tells us

The topics are by all measure extremely contentious for Haryana, which came into existence asserting its distinctive identity, and where political leaders pride themselves on the same.

Cut to the Haryana Assembly campaign now. On September 23, Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) secretary general Digvijay Singh Chautala installed a statue of Sidhu Moose Wala amid a huge gathering on the Sirsa-Dhabwali road near Sawant Khera, a village close to the state’s border with Punjab.

Chautala told The Indian Express that he had ”gone to the house of Sidhu Moose Wala following his death (he was killed in May 2022) along with the people of Dhabwali”.

He added: “We had promised his (Moose Wala’s) father Balkaur Singh that we would install the statue. But he asked us to wait for the Punjab government to install the statue first. However, the Punjab government didn’t install the statue, so we decided to install it in Dhabwali.”

“Balkaur Singh was supposed to come for the unveiling of the statue, but he decided not to due to the ongoing elections in Haryana. He told me he would come after the elections are over,” he said.

On SYL, Chautala said it was not a big issue. “He was a singer (Moose Wala). He sang a song. Maybe he was asked by locals, or someone gave him the song. But that is not a big issue. Even many politicians from Punjab come to Haryana for political campaigns, including Bhagwant Mann and Raja Warring. They also have views on SYL,” he said.

Until a few years ago, Punjab and Haryana were often seen as rivals in every field. The claims of both states on river waters have remained central to this rivalry. But the farmers’ agitation against the three farm laws introduced by the Union government in 2020 brought both the agrarian states together for the first time since 1966, the year Haryana was formed out of Punjab. Politicians too did not want to alienate the farmers and backed the protesters.

Now, a prominent Haryana leader like Digvijay installing Sidhu Moose Wala’s statue in Haryana amidst the election points towards the changed dynamic between the two states, even as SYL remains a ground for dispute.

“No doubt that people of Punjab and Haryana have come closer, and this brotherhood should be strengthened in the coming time. But I look upon Sidhu Moose Wala not just as a singer; I see him as a revolutionary. Sidhu Moose Wala gives hope to the poor that they can rise. He is a big inspiration,” said Chautala.