Chandigarh, Sep 2 (IANS) The ruling Akali Dal Friday sought a probe as to why a senior lawyer misled the Punjab and Haryana High Court on the voting rights of Sehajdhari Sikhs in the SGPC elections of Sep 18.
The Akali Dal demand came just after Home Minister P. Chidambaram told parliament that no changes had been made in the norms of the SGPC election and that the exercise would be held according to schedule.
The clarification came a day after central government counsel Harbhagwan Singh, an advocate general in Punjab under the Congress government in the state, told the court that a 2003 notification preventing Sehajdhari or non-baptised Sikhs from voting in the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee elections had been withdrawn.
The court was hearing pleas seeking voting rights to Sehajdhari or non-baptised Sikhs.
‘We would like to know who is behind all this. The government should probe this,’ Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal, who is also the deputy chief minister, told reporters here.
The issue was taken up in the Rajya Sabha by the Akali Dal and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Reading a statement on behalf of Chidambaram, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal said the government had not withdrawn the notification.
Bansal said no one had briefed the advocate Harbhagwan Singh. ‘He had no authority to make the statement that the notification would be withdrawn.’
‘The government wishes to make it clear that there is no proposal to resend or withdraw the notification dated Oct 8, 2003. Elections to the SGPC will be held as per schedule. Government will also bring the above facts to the notice of the high court,’ he said.
BJP leader Arun Jaitley said the counsel’s statement had created tension in Punjab.
‘In the last 24 hours, huge tension has been created. The impression is that the government is interfering in a religious institution,’ he said.
After Jaitley’s statement, Chidambaram got up to say that he would ask the senior counsel why he made the statement.
‘At this stage, I submit we need not attribute any motive to anyone. Let us find out what has happened,’ Chidambaram said.
On Thursday, the SGPC, Akali Dal and other Sikh bodies alleged a ‘conspiracy’ against the community and slammed the government’s ‘attempt to interfere’ in their affairs.
The SGPC, an elected religious body of Sikhs for control and management of the gurdwaras in Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Chandigarh, has an annual budget of Rs.580 crore.
The notification barring non-baptised Sikhs from voting was passed in 2003 during the National Democratic Alliance regime following a resolution adopted by the SGPC on March 30, 2002.
Around 60 lakh Sikh voters have registered for the SGPC polls, scheduled for Sep 18.
