With the Di­rec­torate Gur­d­wara Elec­tions of the Gov­ern­ment of Delhi is­su­ing pub­lic no­tices in lead­ing Delhi news­pa­pers, the process for con­duct­ing the elec­tions to the gen­eral house of the Delhi Sikh Gur­d­wara Man­age­ment Com­mit­tee has be­gun with vot­ers to be en­listed on­line and of­fice from 22 Oc­to­ber 2020 with the last date as 20 No­vem­ber 2020. Di­rec­tions to start the poll process were is­sued by the Delhi High Court on 14 Oc­to­ber af­ter re­ject­ing the plea of the Badal Dal to de­lay the elec­tions till fresh voter lists are pre­pared.

AS VAR­I­OUS RE­LI­GIOUS AND PO­LIT­I­CAL GROUPS ARE SCUR­RY­ING TO GET THEIR ACT TO­GETHER -look­ing for new can­di­dates, en­tic­ing turn­coats from other groups and some look­ing for younger can­di­dates and sup­port­ers, the Di­rec­torate Gur­d­wara Elec­tions of the Gov­ern­ment of Delhi, which is man­dated to con­duct the Elec­tions un­der the Delhi Gur­d­wara Man­age­ment Act, 1971, has placed ad­ver­tise­ments in news­pa­pers call­ing all el­i­gi­ble Sikh vot­ers to en­rol them­selves on­line and of­fline.

The pub­lic no­tice is­sued by the Di­rec­torate men­tions who is is an el­i­gi­ble voter and also asks them to fill in Form 4 for reg­is­tra­tion as a fresh voter, Form 5 for ob­ject­ing to an elec­tor and Form 6 for seek­ing any cor­rec­tion in the ex­ist­ing voter list. The Photo Elec­toral Rolls are avail­able with the Zonal of­fices or on­line on the Di­rec­torate web­site. The List of EROs of Zonal of­fices is also avail­able on the web­site for easy ref­er­ence.

The Delhi Sikh Gur­d­waras Man­age­ment Act, 1971, the Delhi Sikh Gur­d­wara Man­age­ment Rules, 1974 and other le­gal as­pects of the Delhi Sikh Gur­d­wara Man­age­ment Com­mit­tee are not avail­able on the Delhi Gov­ern­men­t’s Di­rec­torate Gur­d­wara Elec­tion web­site.

The DGE has is­sued pub­lic no­tices only in Eng­lish and Hindi for Sikh vot­ers of Delhi.

The voter list which is used as a ba­sis is the Voter list pre­pared on the ba­sis of the gen­eral voter list, which was cor­rected on the last two oc­ca­sions and for which there have been many com­plaints of mis­man­age­ment and tam­per­ing of the voter lists.

The qual­i­fi­ca­tions of a Sikh voter for the DS­GMC polls is men­tioned in de­tail on the web­site.

WHO IS EL­I­GI­BLE TO VOTE IN DS­GMC ELEC­TIONS? Every Sikh cit­i­zen who is:
1. Re­sid­ing at a place for not less than 180 days in a Ward.
2. Has at­tained the age of 18 years or more as
on 1st Jan­u­ary 2021.
3. Not trim­ming or shav­ing his beard or Ke­shas.
4. Not smok­ing and tak­ing Al­co­holic Drinks.

Iron­i­cally, as is al­ways done, the di­rec­torate has is­sued no­tices only in Eng­lish and Hindi for Sikh vot­ers of Delhi.   For reg­is­tra­tion of votes, go to the web­site of the Di­rec­torate Gur­d­wara Elec­tions.

WHICH FORM TO FILL?
FORM NO. 4 FOR BE­COM­ING AN ELEC­TOR.
FORM NO. 5 FOR OB­JEC­TION TO AN ELEC­TOR.
FORM NO. 6 FOR COR­REC­TION IN THE EX­IST­ING ELEC­TORAL ROLLS. 

Though the Di­rec­torate had stated that it will com­plete the process of voter re­vi­sion in 6 months, the no­tice gives only one mon­th’s time to reg­is­ter as fresh vot­ers, file ob­jec­tions and make amend­ments.

Notwith­stand­ing all the anom­alies in the sys­tem, it is the duty of each and every, el­i­gi­ble Sikh voter, in Delhi to be on the Sikh Vot­ers List for the Delhi Sikh Gur­d­wara Man­age­ment Com­mit­tee.  The Gur­d­waras, the in­sti­tu­tions, the her­itage, the im­age, the rep­u­ta­tion and sta­tus of Sikhs in Delhi is the col­lec­tive re­spon­si­bil­ity of all Sikh cit­i­zens of Delhi and not just of a way­ward Sikh lead­er­ship -past or pre­sent.

The Wash­ing­ton Post tagline is “Democ­racy dies in dark­ness.”  We need to learn from this. In the last DS­GMC elec­tions, the voter reg­is­tra­tion as well as the voter turnout was very low. Sikh res­i­dents of Delhi owe it to them­selves to reg­is­ter and vote in large num­bers.

World Sikh News ex­horts Sikh cit­i­zens of Delhi to en­sure that every sin­gle Sikh res­i­dent of Delhi reg­is­ters as a voter.

Let Delhi Sikhs set an ex­am­ple that the whole Sikh pop­u­la­tion is seized with what will be the fu­ture course of the com­mu­nity in the cap­i­tal of In­dia.

Do you want to sus­tain the im­age of the in­cum­bents or the turn­coats or in­fuse new en­ergy and di­rec­tion?

The re­spon­si­bil­ity is yours and not that of the state ma­chin­ery.  Be­gin with your­self, then your fam­ily, then the neigh­bour­hood and then Gur­d­waras. En­sure that every­one reg­is­ters as a voter.