Badal government takes a knock in the wake of growing unrest in Punjab
BADAL DISPENSATION IS IN A DAMAGE CONTROL MODE TO RETRIEVE LOST GROUND IN RUN UP TO THE STATE ELECTIONS THAT ARE DUE TO TAKE PLACE IN JANUARY 2017
A debilitating public unrest that has gripped Punjab for the past one month is being seen as a manifestation of simmering disenchantment among the Sikh masses against the nineyearrule of the Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP government.
Ever since the protests erupted five weeks ago with farmers’ weeklong ‘rail roko’ agitation, the Badal family has been the main target of public ire. After the Akali DalBJP combine dethroned Captain Amarinder Singh’s Congress government in February 2007 assembly slugfest, it is for the first time that the leadership of the ageing but politically active and astute Parkash Singh Badal is being questioned openly. The current crisis has reinforced public perception about the Badal clan controlling all the levers of power.
In the 18-member cabinet, including the CM, the Badal family has three other ministers who hold major portfolios. CM Badal’s son Sukhbir is a deputy CM with portfolios such as home, excise and taxation, power, housing and urban development. Badal’s son-in-law Adaish Partap Singh Kairon, known for having strong business interests, is a food minister. No one can, even not the CM himself, remotely touch or peep into Kairon’s departments. His secretive style of functioning is a bone of contention within the Badal cabinet. Not just this, another powerful minister of the Badal family is Bikram Singh Majithia, highly ambitious brother-in-law of Sukbir.
In the Modi government also Badals have a presence as Sukhbir’s wife Harsimrat Kaur Badal, known for her angry and arrogant persona, is the union cabinet minister.
The public perception about Punjab’s first political family is such that Badals are linked to every malaise afflicting the border state. And Sikhs perceive that the five term CM Badal has been (mis) using even Sikh religious bodies— including the Akal Takht, the highest temporal seat of the Sikhs---to achieve his political goals.
The current unrest was triggered on September 24 after the Akal Takht pardoned Sirsa -based Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh in a 2007 blasphemy case—a decision allegedly taken at the behest of the Badals keeping in view the significant presence of Dera followers in Malwa belt of Punjab.
The move to close the Sirsa dera chief blasphemy case pitchforked Sikh radicals and hardliners onto the centre-stage. Since then the government has been lurching from one crisis to another. While farmers had lifted the rail blockades, a series of shocking incidents of sacrilege of the Guru Granth Sahib started surfacing in different regions of the state. The anger of Sikh masses took the shape of state-wide protests and road blockades. Meanwhile, Sikh radical outfits are active and exploiting the public anger to the hilt.
The off-balance Badal dispensation is now in a damage control mode to retrieve lost ground in the run up to the assembly polls due in January 2017.
The Congress is in disarray and AAP is struggling to find a credible face in Punjab. But the popularity of Badals and the Akali Dal has hit rock bottom from where recovery will be a difficult task.