The may­hem spread by the COVID 2.0 pan­demic in Delhi and other parts of In­dia is be­com­ing un­con­trol­lable by the hour. Aam Aadmi Party Delhi gov­ern­ment of Arvind Ke­jri­wal is tak­ing the naive Sikhs of Delhi for a royal ride. WSN ed­i­tor Jag­mo­han Singh ap­peals to the Delhi Sikh elec­torate to stay home, stay healthy and stay safe. Should bet­ter sense not pre­vail even at this eleventh hour, just two days prior to polls, Delhi Sikhs must stay away from the elec­tions and teach a les­son to both the gov­ern­ment and the Sikh lead­ers. At this nth hour, Sikhs in Delhi have no choice but to rise as one man and pro­claim that they will not par­tic­i­pate in the sham elec­tions to the DS­GMC.

The Delhi CM wrote to Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor Delhi, Anil Bai­jal on 20 April 2021, af­ter Sikhs cried hoarse, to is­sue a no­ti­fi­ca­tion for post­pone­ment of Delhi Sikh Gur­d­wara Man­age­ment Com­mit­tee polls to 13 May, but his Di­rec­tor of Di­rec­torate Gur­d­wara Elec­tions -Narinder Singh, tells a sec­tion of the me­dia that elec­tions will be held on sched­ule on 25 April 2021.

It is highly ironic that on the one hand, Delhi Chief Min­is­ter Arvind Ke­jri­wal is mak­ing a de­tailed rec­om­men­da­tion to LG Delhi for the post­pone­ment of elec­tions, whereas on the other hand, the Di­rec­tor of Gur­d­wara Elec­tion Di­rec­torate is telling a sec­tion of the me­dia that, “as far as we are con­cerned, elec­tions are on.”  Sikh rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the AAP gov­ern­ment in Delhi are main­tain­ing a stud­ied si­lence and con­tinue to of­fer lame-duck ex­cuses for the gov­ern­men­t’s lax­ity and in­de­ci­sive­ness.

It has been re­ported that nei­ther the Mu­nic­i­pal Cor­po­ra­tion of Delhi nor the Delhi Po­lice has arranged for man­ning of staff at the many elec­toral booths.

Delhi Sikhs, in deep slum­ber as ever, but now shaken by the sec­ond wave of the COVID19 virus are en­gaged in sav­ing their lives but are not re­sist­ing at­tempts by the Delhi gov­ern­ment to be­fool them in such try­ing times. On the other hand, DS­GMC pres­i­dent and Badal Dal leader Man­jin­der Singh Sirsa wants peo­ple to par­tic­i­pate in polls de­fy­ing the cur­few or­ders.

So far in­di­vid­u­ally and col­lec­tively, the al­ter­na­tive groups in Delhi -so­cial, Sewa, re­li­gious have failed to ex­cite the Sikhs for the DS­GMC polls. De­spite her­culean ef­forts by the WSN, through an on­line cam­paign, as many as 75,000 plus votes were can­celled be­cause of non-ver­i­fi­ca­tion. It is quite pos­si­ble that a large num­ber of these may have been bo­gus votes made by the Badal Dal in their last tenure, but the num­ber of reg­is­tered vot­ers also shows that barely 60 per cent of the el­i­gi­ble vot­ers reg­is­tered as vot­ers.

This “could­n’t care less at­ti­tude” of the Delhi Sikhs is largely re­spon­si­ble for the malaise that con­fronts them. Apo­lit­i­cal bod­ies have also failed to “catch the bull by its horns.”

Man­jin­der Singh Sirsa call­ing for hold­ing elec­tions in these times is like Nero play­ing the flute while Rome was burn­ing.

Man­jin­der Singh Sirsa, rid­ing high on the wave of “ser­vice to hu­man­ity” and the ubiq­ui­tous Guru ka Lan­gars, wants to con­tinue his “Sewa” but is un­mind­ful that death is stalk­ing the Sikhs of Delhi, can­di­dates are un­der quar­an­tine, health sys­tem and fa­cil­i­ties have choked and col­lapsed and his call for the con­duct of elec­tions is like ‘Nero play­ing the flute while Rome was burn­ing.”

In a Face­book live on 16 April, Man­jin­der Singh Sirsa, be­ing ul­tra-con­fi­dent that he is go­ing to win, re­quested peo­ple to come out and vote. He cat­e­gor­i­cally said that do not go on ru­mours that the elec­tion is be­ing post­poned. Yes­ter­day, on Face­book and in a voice note, he ex­horted his party can­di­dates to ap­point elec­tion agents and com­plete all other pre-elec­tion day for­mal­i­ties.

Taken aback at the crass na­ture of these lead­ers, a young voter from the trans-Ya­muna area, Aman­deep Singh told WSN, “Do we re­ally need such lead­ers? Such mean and in­hu­man peo­ple should be dis­qual­i­fied from pub­lic life, who do not value the lives of peo­ple who are fac­ing huge hard­ships to save their lives from COVID19 pan­demic.”

Young Sikh ac­tivist -Bal­jeet Singh, speak­ing to WSN asked, “Do these lead­ers know how many young Sikhs have died so far? It is a pa­thetic sit­u­a­tion that any­one should even think of elec­tions dur­ing these times.” The Gur­d­wara Sahib in De­fence Colony has been shut and the lo­cal Mandir is likely to fol­low suit soon.

Di­rec­tor Narinder Singh of the Di­rec­torate of Gur­d­wara Elec­tions is in­ac­ces­si­ble to the elec­torate and the me­dia in gen­eral. One of his re­turn­ing of­fi­cers had the au­dac­ity to call JAGO party can­di­date Par­min­der Singh, ask­ing him to come to the elec­tion of­fice to com­plete for­mal­i­ties, de­spite the cur­few and de­spite no cur­few e-pass.

Di­rec­tor Narinder Singh of the Di­rec­torate of Gur­d­wara Elec­tions is in­ac­ces­si­ble to the elec­torate and the me­dia in gen­eral. One of his re­turn­ing of­fi­cers had the au­dac­ity to call JAGO party can­di­date Par­min­der Singh, ask­ing him to come to the elec­tion of­fice to com­plete for­mal­i­ties, de­spite the cur­few and de­spite no cur­few e-pass.

Deeply wor­ried at the wors­en­ing health sit­u­a­tion in Delhi, so­cial ac­tivist Gur­preet Singh from Chandi­garh chas­tised the Delhi gov­ern­ment for its dual ap­proach. Sikh lives can­not be sac­ri­ficed at the al­tar of in­de­ci­sive­ness of the Delhi gov­ern­ment and the Di­rec­torate must im­me­di­ately call off the elec­tions. On the one hand, we talk of can­celling polls in other states and here we are mak­ing a mess of the lives of Sikhs.

The sit­u­a­tion is heart­break­ing. As I write these lines, I can hear the shrieks of rel­a­tives. I can­not em­pathise more with the fam­ily of Brigadier Re­tired Rash­pal Singh Par­mar, who died en route from Delhi to Chandi­garh, be­cause he could not get a bed in Delhi, in­clud­ing in the Army base hos­pi­tal there.

In­clud­ing Sirsa, none of the other lead­ers showed ex­em­plary courage to for­get elec­tion­eer­ing and set up a task force to co­or­di­nate com­mu­nity as­sis­tance to those in need. Dis­traught at the state of af­fairs, run­ning from pil­lar to post to col­lect cylin­ders and pro­vide to those in need, young Sikh ac­tivist Amardeep Singh said, “In sol­i­dar­ity with Sikhs who have died and con­tinue to die, all Sikhs must boy­cott the DS­GMC elec­tions in a be­fit­ting re­ply to the pre­var­i­ca­tions of the Delhi gov­ern­ment and a slap to the likes of Sirsa who want to get the elec­tions held by hook or by crook.

Dis­gusted at the de­lay in re­sponse from the of­fice of Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor’s of­fice to the rec­om­men­da­tion of Delhi CM Ke­jri­wal for post­pone­ment of the DS­GMC elec­tions and with none of the bu­reau­cratic staff an­swer­ing phones, WSN Delhi Desk as­so­ci­ate Gurmeet Singh has started an On­line Pe­ti­tion ad­dressed to the LG seek­ing prompt ac­tion. Con­sci­en­tious Sikh cit­i­zens are in­vited to sign the pe­ti­tion.

Gurmeet Singh said, “As protests on the streets are ruled out, this is a de­mo­c­ra­tic op­tion which the Sikhs must ex­er­cise. Sikhs do not want to add up to the woes of their fam­ily, friends, so­ci­ety and the city at large. A large num­ber of Sikhs are averse to vot­ing and the gov­ern­ment must see the writ­ing on the wall.”

Lead­ing in­dus­tri­al­ist Iqbal Singh Anand, who has been tak­ing a keen in­ter­est in the DS­GMC polls fears that “Should the elec­tions be held in such a dan­ger­ous at­mos­phere, com­mit­ted cadres will ex­er­cise fran­chise and we will have a Kash­mir-like ver­dict.”

“The LT Gov­er­nor Delhi must not play pol­i­tics, ei­ther on his own or at the be­hest of the Union gov­ern­ment, un­der the new law wherein he has more pow­ers and can­cels these elec­tions for the time be­ing,” he added.

Iqbal Singh Anand, lead­ing in­dus­tri­al­ist

“The LT Gov­er­nor Delhi must not play pol­i­tics, ei­ther on his own or at the be­hest of the Union gov­ern­ment, un­der the new law wherein he has more pow­ers and can­cels these elec­tions for the time be­ing,” he added.

Dif­fi­cult sit­u­a­tions re­quire brave de­ci­sions, not pre­var­i­ca­tion. The life and safety of all peo­ple, in­clud­ing Sikhs are im­por­tant and cru­cial. All elec­tions can wait.