Amritsar-The Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) President Harjinder Singh Dhami sharply reacting to the statement of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Harjit Grewal said that the Sikh body SGPC, being the watchdog of Panth, will always raise its voice on activities against Sikh principles. He said that after the SGPC raised objection to some members of the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) joining BJP, Harjit Grewal is making statements under the conspiratorial policy of BJP of creating confusion, doubts and sowing the seeds of suspicion about the Sikh principles, while the Sikh Panth knows how Bharatiya Janata Party is working to eliminate the rights of minorities.
Harjinder Singh Dhami said that BJP, working under the agenda of RSS, wants to directly and indirectly influence the management of Gurdwaras by interfering in Sikh issues, while people like Harjit Grewal seem in haste to implement BJP's anti-Sikh agenda.
The SGPC President said that the Centre government led by BJP, to which Grewal is calling as a pro-Sikh party, has failed to resolve the pending Sikh issues. He said that whether it is the issue of Sikh prisoners lodged in jails for three decades or the issues of Gurdwaras in the states outside Punjab, the BJP-led Centre government has never taken the initiative to solve them. Even the BJP government does not consider it appropriate to give time to the SGPC, the representative body of the Sikhs, regarding Sikh issues, he said.
He said that Grewal, who is ignorant of Sikh principles, should not forget that the SGPC and Shiromani Akali Dal are two parts of the same movement, which have always represented Sikh affairs with joint efforts. These Panthic institutions are not the properties of any one but their history has been representative of people's struggle, he said. Advocate Dhami said that from time to time efforts have been made by the governments to weaken these Panthic institutions, to which the community has always given a befitting response. Even at present, these organizations are the representatives of Sikhs and will continue to challenge every anti-Sikh phenomenon, he said.
On the question raised by Grewal regarding the issue of sacrilege, the SGPC President said that during the Shiromani Akali Dal government, the environment of the state was spoiled by sacrilege of the holy Saroops (scriptures) of Sri Guru Granth Sahib in Punjab by anti-Sikh people. He said that it has become clear from the facts that have come out in the recent past that the incidents of sacrilege are directly committed by people related to Dera Sirsa. He questioned that Grewal should tell about whose government in Haryana is kind to Dera Sirsa head Gurmeet Ram Rahim, who has been named as the main culprit in the tragic cases of sacrilege? Why is he being given repeated and unrestricted paroles?
The SGPC president said that Harjit Grewal has no understanding that the SGPC is running more than 100 educational institutions across the country besides working to preach Sikhi through its missions in different states. He said that although providing education is the work of governments, the Sikh body SGPC has taken the lead and successfully run educational institutions in Punjab as well as in other states. An example of this is the thousands of students studying in the SGPC’s educational institutions, who are connected to education as well as moral values and Sikh heritage. The SGPC President clearly said that the SGPC will never back down from representing Sikh principles and Sikh concerns.