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New SGPC president Harjinder Dhami is a low-key leader with strong Panthic credentials
Harjinder Singh Dhami, who started activism with the All India Sikh Students’ Federation, has a decades-long association with the Sikh shrine management body SGPC
Harjinder Singh Dhami (65), who on Monday was elected as the new president of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC), started activism with the All India Sikh Students’ Federation (AISSF) and has a decades-long association with the Sikh shrine body.
The low-profile leader, who is known for humility, served as SGPC general secretary when Gobind Singh Longowal was at the helm of the management committee. Last year, he was appointed by the general house as honorary chief secretary of the SGPC.
Hailing from Piplanwala village in Hoshiarpur district, Dhami, a senior lawyer, became an SGPC member for the first time in 1996 from the Sham Churasi constituency and has been a member since.
He was a close confidant of late Gurcharan Singh Tohra who remained SGPC president for 25 years. He supported Tohra during a feud between the latter and the then chief minister Parkash Singh Badal in 1999. Tohra and Badal buried the hatchet in 2003, before the death of the former a year later.
Satbir Singh, former SGPC secretary and currently personal secretary to Dhami, said, “As a lawyer, he has fought the cases of Sikh militants in various courts. As an AISSF activist in the 1980s he took part in a morcha against the emergency imposed by the then prime minister Indira Gandhi. Then he served in the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on various district-level posts.”
He added, “Though the SGPC chief secretary’s is a paid job, he did not draw any salary.”
Dhami, who is the legal counsel of the Badal family in a case of alleged forgery of the constitution of the Akali Dal, secured bail to Sukhbir Singh Badal and party spokesperson Daljit Singh Cheema.
Dal Khalsa leader Harcharanjit Singh Dhami said, “During militancy, he fought cases of Sikh militants free of cost. He got many militants released from jails.”
He was among the SGPC functionaries who honoured Jugraj Singh, a key accused in the January 26 Red Fort violence on July 1 this year.
