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Karamjit Singh elected as president of ad-hoc HSGMC committee
Strap: Outgoing president Baljit Singh Daduwal opposes, alleging proper procedure for the election was not followed: Karamjit Singh, chief of Yamunanagar-based Sewapanthi sect, was on Wednesday elected as the president of the ad-hoc committee of the Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (HSGMC)
Strap: Outgoing president Baljit Singh Daduwal opposes, alleging proper procedure for the election was not followed
: Karamjit Singh, chief of Yamunanagar-based Sewapanthi sect, was on Wednesday elected as the president of the ad-hoc committee of the Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (HSGMC).
However, outgoing president Baljit Singh Daduwal opposed Karamjit’s election, a meeting for which was held at the mini-secretariat here.
Kurukshetra deputy commissioner Shantanu Sharma, who was the returning officer for the election, said that that Karamjit Singh has been elected as the president unanimously, while Gurwinder Singh Dhamija, deputy chairman of Haryana Punjabi Sahitya Academy has been appointed as the general secretary, Bhupinder Singh as senior vice-president, Baba Gurmit Singh as junior vice-president and Mohanjit Singh as joint secretary.
Also, Bibi Ravinder Kaur Ajrana, Jaswant Singh, Gurbaksh Singh, Ramneek Singh, Jagsir Singh and Viner Singh- were elected as the working committee members of the 37-member committee.
Daduwal left the meeting, alleging that proper procedure was not followed to elect the HSGMC head.
Daduwal was elected as the president of the HSGMC (ad-hoc) on August 13, 2020, defeating Jagbir Singh Khalsa by a narrow margin of two votes.
Talking to Hindustan Times, Daduwal said that the meeting was called under the monitoring of the deputy commissioner and soon after the proceedings of the election began after filing of the nomination papers, Gurwinder Singh Dhamija, who is also considered as a close associate of chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar proposed the name of Karamjit for the president, saying that these are the directions of the chief minister.
“I opposed this proposal as I don’t find Karamjit suitable for this position. They wanted to appoint me as Sarprast (Chief Patron) of this committee but I refused as the Guru Granth Sahib is the supreme patron of this committee and nobody can take this place,” he said
He said that Karamjit did not have any role in the formation of the separate Sikh body for gurdwaras in Haryana.
Daduwal said that he will continue as a member of this committee and seek legal and sangat’s opinion on this development.
Didar Singh Nalvi, another member of the committee, also expressed his dissatisfaction over the election of Bhupinder Singh as senior vice president, claiming that proper procedure was not followed as some members had proposed his name for this position.
Nalvi claimed that four members along with him had left the meeting after Daduwal, saying that how it can be termed as a unanimous election.
Nalvi said that he did not have any objection over the appointment of the president but he will seek legal opinion to challenge the appointment of senior vice president.
However, Kurukshetra DC Shantanu Sharma has refuted the allegations, saying that election for all the positions was conducted unanimously and under the guidelines issued in the notification issued by the government.
The Supreme Court in September this year upheld the validity of the Haryana Sikh Gurdwara (Management) Act, 2014, thus paving the way for the HSGMC to control all gurdwaras in the state. Later, the Haryana chief minister stated that the election of the Haryana Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee will be held within 18 months and till then, the ‘ad-hoc committee’ will look after the functioning of the gurdwaras.
Since former president Jagdish Singh Jhinda had already resigned as member of the committee, alleging intervention of the government in the religious matters of the Sikh community, now the HSGMC has 37 members. As per the HSGMC Act, there should be 41 members in the committee.
