Punjab: SAD to elect new president at delegate session on April 12

The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) will conduct the much-awaited elections for choosing a new president of the party on April 12 at the Teja Singh Samundari hall in the Golden Temple complex in Amritsar.

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The working committee of the party decided to hold the general delegate session of the party on April 12 for the purpose. The meeting, which was presided over by party working committee president Balwinder Singh Bhundar, also decided to hold a political conference on the occasion of Baisakhi on April 13 in Talwandi Sabo.

The announcement means the SAD will elect its president as per its own membership and not through the seven-member panel (later reduced to five) formed by the former Akal Takht Jatehdar Giani Raghbir Singh for conducting the party’s membership and organisation elections.

Giving further details, party senior leader Dr Daljit Singh Cheema said the working committee also expressed its serious concern at the deteriorating law and order situation in Punjab with bomb blasts occurring at several police stations in the border belt as well as at the Thakurdwara temple in Amritsar, vandalising of the statues of Babasaheb B R Ambedkar as well as the grenade attack on the residence of senior BJP leader Manoranjan Kalia. He said the working committee was of the considered view that Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann had allowed the situation to go out of hand and should resign immediately.

The SAD leader said the working committee also condemned the amendments made to the Waqf Act, asserting that earlier the Central Government had also interfered in the functioning of the management boards of Sri Hazur Sahib and Takht Patna Sahib. “Members were of the view that government takeover of the Waqf Boards could be detrimental to the interests of the minority community and that this would increase polarisation in the country.”

Dr Cheema said the working committee also took serious note of how the Constitution was being violated in Punjab, with “outsiders from Delhi” being handed over the reins of the state. He said this was seen in the manner in which the name of Delhi AAP leader was put on plaques to commemorate minor repair works in schools even as the names of the local MP and legislator as well as the school management committee were missing.