Elections schedule for Haryana Sikh gurdwara management committee withdrawn

A separate committee to manage affairs of gurdwaras in Haryana was formed in 2022 after the Supreme Court upheld the constitutional validity of the Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Management Act, 2014.Thereafter, the Haryana government had nominated HSGMC, an ad hoc gurdwara panel whose tenure was to expire in 18 months.

Haryana gurdwara elections commissioner Justice H S Bhalla (retd) on Thursday withdrew the elections schedule for the Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee.

The development came a day after the commissioner released the schedule for holding the HSGMC polls on March 6. In a statement, Justice Bhalla stated the Director of Secondary Education Department of Haryana has written a letter requesting for withdrawing the schedule of elections of the HSGMC.

In the letter, it has been mentioned that the schedule of the said elections falls between the annual examinations of the tenth and twelfth classes conducted by the CBSE and the Haryana School Education Board, said the statement.

Justice Bhalla said the schedule of the elections has been withdrawn in the interest of the students.

Earlier, Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) chief Harjinder Singh Dhami had urged the gurdwara elections commissioner to revise the voters list before initiating the election process, alleging several ''irregularities'', including addition of non-Sikhs in the list and not putting up pictures of voters in the voting list.

Dhami said, ''The election schedule to the HSGMC has been announced in haste without holding any meeting with political parties.'' No provision had been kept to register political parties for allocation of symbols and this was being seen as an attempt to ''deny'' registration to the representative body of the Sikhs the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), he said.

''This should be corrected,'' he added.

The SGPC president alleged perusal of some voting lists had revealed a large number of non-Sikh names who were not eligible to vote for the gurdwara elections.

He further alleged that besides this, pictures of the voters had not been included in the voters list, which would make it difficult to identify genuine voters and could result in ''malpractices''.

Dhami also alleged that only 390 booths had been earmarked in the entire state for voting. ''This means voters from an average of twenty villages will vote in one designated booth,'' he said, adding this would cause inconvenience to voters. A separate committee to manage affairs of gurdwaras in Haryana was formed in 2022 after the Supreme Court upheld the constitutional validity of the Haryana Sikh Gurdwara (Management) Act, 2014.

Thereafter, the Haryana government had nominated HSGMC, an ad hoc gurdwara panel whose tenure was to expire in 18 months.

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