JALANDHAR: Having completed the intractable task of selecting and fielding 45 candidates for the July 9 elections to the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC), the Shiromani Akali Dal leadership in Punjab has now decided to take up the more complex task of replacing the 65member working committee of the party announced unilaterally by Ashok Singhi Baparian on june4) The party sources have said president Parkash Singh Badal and SGPC chief Gurcharan Singh Tohra would play a vital role in reorganizing the setup which had been rejected by leaders of both the erstwhile Badal and Amritsar factions. They said more than even Badal, the SGPC president has a “‘major” role to working out the consensus on the organization because he had been playing a “pivotal” role in such task till last year.
The sources said the party leaders irrespective of their allegiance to erstwhile factions now looked towards Tohra who, they added, has the capability to put a new organizational setup in place. This was so particularly in view of the “positive and constructive” role played by him in Giddarbaha elections as also in the selection of candidates for the DSGMC elections.
The Akali sources said barring the personality clash between Jaswant Singh Sethi, the current president of DSGMC now elected unopposed from Rajinder Nagar constituency in Delhi and Inder Pal Singh Khalsa, the can Gidate selection exercise was conducted smoothly. They said another heartening feature of the exercise was the vigorous participation of Sucha Singh Chhotepur and Jagmohan Singh Tony, leaders of erstwhile Maan faction, in the party board which interviewed candidates.
The sources said as many as 38 of the 45 candidates were selected “unanimously,” while the remaining ‘seven were decided by a committee of six leaders comprising Badal, Tohra, Surjit Singh Barnala, Kuldip Singh Wadala, Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa and Prem Chandumajra. The party did not field candidate for the Dilshad garden constituency where an independent would be supported by it, the sources said. Besides 46 elected members of the DSGMC house, five members are coopted. Of these two are nominated by the house, two are representatives of the Singh Sabhas in the jurisdiction the DSGMC and one is a nominee next of the SGPC. ‘The sources said the party leaders were expected to meet again to begin afresh the exercise of setting up new organizational setup. They said the leadership was not unduly worried over the delay because of “understanding” among the top leaders which, they added, was evident from the victory in Giddarbaha as also the process of selection of candidates for the DSGMC.
Article extracted from this publication >> June 23, 1995
