Hope for a reset in Akali politics

DECEMBER 2, 2024, will be remembered as an important day in the contemporary history of the Sikhs and the regional politics of Punjab. It saw the Sikh religious seat of power, the Akal Takht, reasserting its authority over the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD). The five Jathedars summoned nearly the entire party leadership, asking it to admit the criminal misdeeds (gunaah) it had committed while in power and seek forgiveness. Speaking clearly and sharply, they highlighted these ‘misdeeds’ and how they had seriously hurt the Sikh sentiment, interests and wellbeing. Perhaps the most serious of these misdeeds, they proclaimed, had been their indifference and glaring failure to prevent incidents of disrespect (be-adabi) for the Guru Granth Sahib.

The ‘main accused’ who appeared before the Takht was former SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal. But he was not the only one who was held responsible for the criminal wrongdoings. The Jathedars asked all those who had worked with him while he was the Deputy Chief Minister of Punjab to also own up to their involvement and seek forgiveness. They also held the late Parkash Singh Badal, then Chief Minister, equally responsible for these misdeeds and withdrew the honour of Panth Rattan Fakhr-e-Quam bestowed upon him by the Takht in 2011.

Given the nature of their authority, the Jathedars pronounced a range of nominal punishments for all those found ‘guilty’, which the accused ‘humbly’ accepted. They also directed that the SAD be dissolved, along with its parallel or dissident offshoots. The Jathedars announced the formation of a committee and assigned it the task of rebuilding the political party.

The Sikh political system, as we know it today, evolved during the 1920s as an offshoot of the popular movement for the liberation of historic gurdwaras from the control of ‘corrupt mahants’. The movement came up with the idea of managing gurdwaras democratically through a body to be elected by common Sikhs, which came to be known as the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC). It was under the aegis of the SGPC that the SAD came into being as its political wing. The colonial state gave it formal recognition in 1925 as the sole custodian of all historic gurdwaras of Punjab. The SGPC continues to have legal status in independent India.

The history of the Akal Takht, the throne of the timeless one, goes back to the sixth Guru, who established it as a seat of temporal authority (miri), facing the Darbar Sahib (often referred to as the Golden Temple), the seat of its spiritual authority (piri). The Takht became the site for the Sikhs to assemble and discuss the political challenges facing the community. After its formation, the SGPC appointed five Jathedars to collectively deliberate upon and decide on issues of politics and justice.

Over the years, the electoral political process acquired a kind of autonomy and ascendancy over Sikh religious institutions. The SAD emerged as the power centre and its leadership started controlling the affairs of the SGPC as well. Though members of the General House of the SGPC are separately and independently elected by the Sikh electorate, they have tended to be subservient to their political bosses in the SAD. This became most pronounced between 2007 and 2017, when the SAD ruled the state in alliance with the BJP, with the senior Badal as the CM.

It was also the time when the SAD formally acquired a ‘secular’ character, claiming to be a party of all Punjabis. From a Panthic party of the Sikhs, it began to represent itself as a regional party of Punjab, similar to its counterparts in other regions of India. Its organisational character also changed. From a cadre-based party of the Sikh Sangat, it turned into a family-centric party with a limited social base among the agrarian classes/castes of the state. However, its ‘secularisation’ was a purely instrumental strategy. The sole objective of its leadership was staying in power through the management of strategies to garner votes. Sikh religious institutions and their resources, too, became instruments to be deployed in electoral games. Nothing else seemed to matter. Even the Jathedars of the Akal Takht could be arm-twisted, it appeared, if it helped the SAD leadership consolidate its votes.

The common Sikhs felt cheated. Their protests against the incidents of be-adabi of the Guru Granth Sahib were met with high-handedness from the SAD-led state establishment. Some innocent Sikhs were killed during these protests. The Badals also managed to alienate the farming classes, their core electoral constituency, when they initially failed to distance themselves from the Union Government and its imposition of the three notorious farm laws, introduced as ‘ordinances’ in June 2020. Post-2020, the SAD lost its electoral base. Its vote share came down by nearly half.

It was perhaps in the hope of regaining lost ground that the SAD leadership decided to appear before the Akal Takht to seek forgiveness. However, this time, the institution of the Akal Takht acted with a sense of autonomy. In the full glare of the Sangat assembled at the Takht, and during live transmission by the electronic media, the Jathedars exposed the misdeeds of the senior SAD leadership.

December 2 would perhaps mark the end of the Badal brand of Akali politics and a foregrounding of justice and the moral authority of the Panth. What would be the new nature of Akali politics? Would it be possible to revive its cadre and build a new regional party of Punjab that also represents the Sikh identity and interests? How would it change the equations between the regional politics of Punjab and the larger political context of the Indian democracy? The Sikh community, as well as the socio-economic situation of Punjab, is currently undergoing a very important process of churning. Speculating answers to these questions is difficult. However, for the common Sikhs, this certainly appears to be a moment of hope, as they see in it the possibility of a new beginning.