DSGMC funds spent in Lok Sabha elections in Punjab , says SADD

NEW DELHI:The Shiromani Akali Dal (Delhi) led by Sarna brothers said that the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee president Manjinder Singh Sirsa reached out to billionaire Sikhs to bail out the gurdwara committee as its funds were either mismanaged or spent in the Lok Sabha elections in Punjab.

Harvinder Singh Sarna, SADD general secretary

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, May 18

The Shiromani Akali Dal (Delhi) led by Sarna brothers said that the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee president Manjinder Singh Sirsa reached out to billionaire Sikhs to bail out the gurdwara committee as its funds were either mismanaged or spent in the Lok Sabha elections in Punjab.

SADD general secretary Harvinder Singh Sarna said Sirsa had a meeting with influential and billionaire Sikhs of Delhi on May 16, wherein he sought a financial bailout of the DSGMC.

He said the DSGMC was bankrupt. An allegation of mismanagement of funds is levelled against former DSGMC president Manjit Singh GK and a case is going on against him in a Delhi court. The police submitted a closure report in the case, but on May 16, the court rejected it directing for further investigation.

The court ordered that the ousted DSGMC president be charged with more stringent counts of financial fraud, he said.

“The court nailed the Badals’ loot and scoot. The law will soon catch up with Sirsa as he has been party to the plunder as general secretary of the DSGMC under GK. This gang, reporting to the Badals, is collectively responsible for sucking the sangat’s ‘dasvandh’ out of the gurdwara treasury for vested interests,” Sarna said.

He urged Delhi Sikh elite to desist from rescuing the likes of Sirsa from accountability over the robbery of gurdwara exchequer.

He reminded the community about the Guru Granth Sahib sacrilege incident and the killing of youths in police firing in Bargari when Shiromani Akali Dal (Badal) was in power in Punjab. He also reminded about Badal’s unilateral pardon for Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim in 2015.

“People of Punjab punished them for their grave crimes first in the 2017 Assembly elections and are ready again to kick them out of Parliament in the May 19 Lok Sabha polls,” Sarna said.

“The government, meanwhile, should set up an independent board to run the DSGMC and order fresh elections. The Sikh religious administration can no longer be left in control of thugs,” Sarna said.