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Journalism of Courage
With the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) set to elect a new president on Saturday, all roadblocks for Sukhbir Singh Badal to return to the helm of the party appear to have been cleared.
On December 2, the Akal Takht – the highest temporal seat of the Sikhs – had imposed a religious punishment on Sukhbir and other senior party leaders, citing the alleged misrule of the SAD government from 2007 to 2017. Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Raghbir Singh had directed the party’s working committee to accept Badal’s resignation, and form a new committee to initiate a membership drive and begin the process of electing new leadership.
But since then, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC), which is the apex body for gurdwara management in Punjab, and is seen as controlled by the SAD, has removed Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Raghbir Singh, Takht Kesgarh Sahib Jathedar Giani Sultan Singh and Takht Damdama Sahib Jathedar Giani Harpreet Singh from their respective positions – thus doing away with all the jathedars involved in passing the decree to punish Badal.
The move has drawn harsh criticism, with the SAD accused of defying the Akal Takht’s directions on the reorganisation of the party, in order to secure the party president’s post for Badal.
Following the party’s second successive defeat in the Assembly polls in 2022, many senior SAD leaders – from MLA Manpreet Singh Ayali and former MLAs Gurpartap Singh Wadala and Iqbal Singh Jhunda, to former SGPC presidents Bibi Jagir Kaur and Gobind Singh Longowal, and former MP Prem Singh Chandumajra – had turned rebels over Badal refusing to make way for a new face.
Last July, these leaders had approached the Akal Takht with complaints of religious misconduct against Badal, who “confessed” and was declared “tankhaiya”, or guilty of violating the Sikh religious code, by the Akal Takht.
Badal finally resigned as the SAD president in November, only to have the party working committee reject the same. Even after the Akal Takht, while pronouncing the religious sentence for Badal in December, directed the party to accept his resignation within three days, the working committee took over a month to follow through.
Since then, despite not being president any more, Badal has remained at the helm of party affairs. He was the face of the SAD and key speaker at the Maghi Mela, one of Punjab’s most significant religious and political events, just days after his resignation was accepted. He also attended a meeting of the party’s SGPC members. On January 21, when the SAD held a membership drive as per the Akal Takht’s directions, Badal was the first to join the party.
Citing Election Commission guidelines, the SAD had said it needed to run the membership drive on its own rather than rely on a panel that was to be formed by the Akal Takht. The chosen delegates from among the new members will elect a new party president Saturday.
Despite being found guilty of misconduct by the Akal Takht and facing backlash for the removal of the jathedars, Badal remains the clear front-runner for the president’s post. Sources said the party has already given orders to publish banners and posters bearing Badal’s images and labelling him the party president for a rally in Bathinda district on the occasion of Baisakhi on April 13.
During the SAD-led government’s 10-year tenure from 2007 to 2017, Badal was the second-in-command to his father and Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. After becoming the deputy CM, Sukhbir also became the party president in 2008.
During this time, the younger Badal faced little opposition from within the party, including from the SAD leaders who have now turned rebel and demanded his resignation.
The fact also remains that the pool of prospective presidents remains limited, leaving the party with little choice. Former minister Bikram Singh Majithia was among the aspirants, but has fallen out of favour within the SAD after he objected to the removal of the jathedars.
Harsimrat Kaur, Bathinda MP and Badal’s wife, who also happens to be Majithia’s sister, was another name doing the rounds. However, elevating her to the president’s post would further build the perception that the Badal family has a monopoly in the party.
Besides, if the party was looking for a president outside the Badal family, then it would have likely gone along with the Akal Takht panel for its membership drive and delegate elections.
Until 1997, when Parkash Badal became the CM for the third time, the SAD had a diverse leadership. But when Sukhbir Badal was made president in 2008, many veteran leaders were overlooked for the top post.
Under Badal’s leadership, the party organisation was revamped into a more centralised body. He also sought to infuse youth in the party by inducting young leaders, and was also known for engineering defections – asking Opposition MLAs to resign, only to then contest the ensuing bypolls as SAD candidates. Badal surprised many in the party when the SAD won the Assembly polls in 2012 for a consecutive term.
However, since then, both Badal and the SAD have lost considerable ground in the state. The party was targeted for several issues ranging from drug addiction to sand, land and transport mafias. The SAD managed to win just four of the state’s 13 Lok Sabha seats in the 2014 polls, allowing the now-ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) to win four seats and make inroads in the state.
In the 2017 Assembly polls, it was evident the party had lost even its core support base. The SAD won just 15 seats in the 115-member Assembly, with the Congress coming to power. The SAD was reduced to two seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, three seats in the 2022 Assembly polls, and one seat in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls – all markers of the party’s rapid decline under Badal since the SAD fell out of power.
