Jaswinder Singh, a driver by profession, remembers how entire Bargari village contributed money to raise the level of the government middle school where classes were interrupted after every spell of rainfall. “Bargari is a huge village with three panchayats and over 7000 votes. However, people only remember this village now due to the incident of sacrilege. Bargari Morcha also continued here for six months. No doubt we were pained by this incident, but now villagers don’t want to talk about it. This issue suits politicians as they use it for votes,” says Jaswinder. Surjit Singh, a villager in his mid-60s, adds, “We supported Bargari Morcha day and night, but the way they lifted the Morcha made us feel betrayed. Now, we are focused more on development issues.” Not far from Bargari, is Burj Jawahar Singh Wala from where Guru Granth Sahib was stolen from a gurdwara on June 1, 2015 and later torn pages were found in the streets of Bargari on October 12, 2015. The protests that followed led to police firing in Kotkapura town and even Behbal Kalan village, in which two people were killed. Read more election news In Burj Jawahar Singh Wala, shopkeeper Jagjit Singh says,”This election, the village is not going to talk about sacrilege at all. The entire village was questioned by SIT after Guru Granth Sahib was stolen from our village gurdwara. Now, we are satisfied with the working of the SIT as they have arrested persons behind theft which led to the start of sacrilege incidents in Punjab in 2015. In 2017, people remembered the issue as culprits were not punished, but now we have moved on. We want to talk about something else this poll season.” Inside the gurdwara, two men supervising the construction of a hall, say that the village is at peace after a few arrests, adding that “religion is important, but now we need to talk about things other than sacrilege”. Even Sadhu Singh, father Gurjeet Singh who was killed in Behbal Kalan firing says that he is satisfied with the working of SIT, but adds that “persons who gave orders of firing must be punished”. Sadhu Singh, who lives in Sarawan village at few minutes distance from Burj Jawahar Singh Wala, has put up a black flag on the top of his house as a mark of protest. “This flag will be removed, the day killers of my son will be punished. It is in place for more than 3 years now.” Mohinder Singh, father of Krishan Bhagwan Singh who was also killed in police firing, tells The Indian Express: “No doubt the SIT is doing good work, but punishments to the persons who gave orders of firing need to be given at the earliest. We are the affected persons and hence we can feel the loss, otherwise I know our village is not keen to talk about this issue anymore.” A community centre and a village stadium were to be built in both villages in name of the persons killed. These projects were kicked off by the then Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal in July 2016, ahead of Vidhan Sabha polls, but are yet to be completed. According to Harjinder Singh, sarpanch of village Behbal Khurd where Krishan Bhagwan’s family resides,”Poll fever is yet to pick up here, but villagers are not going to be part of sacrilege politics anymore.” Lakhvir Singh, a former member panchayat from Sarawan village, points to the development works that need the community’s urgent attention. “Quality of community centre’s work — being built in Gurjeet Singh’s memory — needs to be checked. Our village pond needs to be renovated and even stadium’s track needs repair. So we need to talk about all these things. Villagers now refuse to even discuss sacrilege issue as it had given us deep pain for years together.”
