Chandigarh: Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on Friday accepted Sukhbir Badal’s resignation as its president, in an attempt to end the crisis pertaining to the criticism it faced and which had reportedly led to its drubbing in the elections since 2017.
The development comes after Akal Takht – the supreme temporal seat of Sikhs – recently directed the SAD to refrain from adopting “dilly-dallying’’ tactics on its directions to accept the resignation of Sukhbir Badal from the post of SAD president and hold fresh elections.
However, the SAD had earlier held that the SAD constitution demanded it to remain secular and therefore by receiving and implementing Akal Takht’s directions would amount to violating conditions.
It may be recalled that Sukhbir had handed over the charge of running the party affairs to working committee led by Balwinder Singh Bhundar on August 30, 2024 and resigned from the post of SAD president on November 16 ahead of receiving religious punishment (tankhah) from Akal Takht.
Akal Takht had on December 2, last, pronounced Sukhbir and others “guilty’’ Akali leaders as “tankhaiya’’ (guilty of religious misconduct) and also directed the SAD working committee to accept Sukhbir’s resignation and others within three days. Sukhbir and others had subsequently served various “tankhah’’ including cleaning utensils and shoes for 10 days at different gurdwaras.
Akal Takht had pronounced the religious punishments to Akali leaders, for mistakes made by Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) during its rule in Punjab from 2007 to 2017 for the “mistakes’’ committed by SAD government from 2007 to 2017 and its failure to address key issues of the Sikh community, when Sukhbir was the party leader and deputy chief minister and SAD patriarch Parkash Singh Badal, the chief minister.
The “mistakes’’ mentioned above included – revocation of the blasphemy case against Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda head Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh for imitating Guru Gobind Singh in 2007, the failure to punish perpetrators of the Bargari sacrilege and police officials for the Kotkapura and Behbal Kalan firing incidents, appointment of controversial IPS officer Sumedh Saini as Punjab DGP besides giving Farzana Alam, the wife of controversial police officer Izhar Alam, the party ticket in the 2012 assembly polls and failing to deliver justice to victims in fake encounter cases.
It was because of these “mistakes’’ that some of the senior SAD leaders had rebelled against Sukhbir last year and approached Akal Takht admitting mistakes and stating that these “mistakes’’ had damaged the image of Panth and weakened the SAD.
