Haryana Sikhs protest over gurdwara panel

Ambala, Haryana: Sikhs demanding a separate gurdwara parbandhak committee for Haryana on Monday protested against the state government for allegedly not keeping its promise in this regard.

Members of the ad hoc Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (HSGPC) raised slogans against the state government and burnt an effigy of chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda for not constituting a separate gurdwara committee for Haryana, as promised in the Congress manifesto for the 2005 assembly elections.

“Despite promising a separate gurdwara committee for Haryana in its election manifesto in 2005, the Congress government, which has been in power since March 2005, has virtually done nothing in this regard,” state general secretary of HSGPC Jasbir Singh Khalsa said here. A separate gurdwara committee would allow Sikhs of Haryana to manage their religious places themselves, he said.

“In 2006, the state government had constituted a committee headed by cabinet minister Harmohinder Singh Chatha to study its modalities. In 2007, Sikhs had submitted 27,500 affidavits to the Chatha Committee in favour of a separate gurdwara committee and Chatha later submitted a report to the state government, but the matter has been hanging fire since then,” he said.

Source: HT