The re­moval of Spe­cial In­ves­ti­ga­tion Team key mem­ber In­spec­tor Gen­eral Kun­war Vi­jay Pratap Singh from his post on a com­plaint of the Shi­ro­mani Akali Dal by the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia, while he was con­duct­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion in the mur­der of two Sikhs in Oc­to­ber 2015, af­ter in­dis­crim­i­nate fir­ing by Pun­jab po­lice, fol­low­ing protests re­lat­ing to des­e­cra­tion of Guru Granth Sahib by Sauda Dera fol­low­ers, has sent shock waves amongst Sikhs. WSN ed­i­tor Jag­mo­han Singh writes an Open Let­ter to ECI chief Sunil Arora protest­ing the move and seek­ing im­me­di­ate re­ver­sal of the de­ci­sion.

 Dear Shri Sunil Arora:Wa­he­guru Ji Ka Khalsa Wa­he­guru Ji Ki Fateh! I have no il­lu­sion about the strength of the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia.  From the Prime Min­is­ter down­wards, all lead­ers, es­pe­cially the rul­ing party lead­ers have been spew­ing venom against each other, tak­ing the hate-filled cam­paign­ing and rhetoric to its nadir.  The Model Code of Con­duct of the ECI is and has al­ways been a cos­metic tool which gives the im­pres­sion to the com­mon man that there is an au­thor­ity check­ing the ut­ter­ances and work of the po­lit­i­cal party, but acts of omis­sion and com­mis­sion by the ECI prove oth­er­wise.

I write this open let­ter to strongly protest the in­ter­fer­ence in the course of jus­tice in a very sen­si­tive case by the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia in the Pun­jab, prompt­ing me to call it the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of the BJP.

The alacrity with which the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion has acted on a friv­o­lous com­plaint is down­right rep­re­hen­si­ble.

The peo­ple of Pun­jab have no love lost for the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia. We still re­mem­ber the dark night of 17 Sep­tem­ber 1991, when less than 10 hours be­fore the peo­ple of Pun­jab were to ex­er­cise their fran­chise, the then Chief Elec­tion Com­mis­sioner T. N. Se­shan, can­celled polls in Pun­jab, with­out as­sign­ing any rea­son what­so­ever. Every time the ECI does some­thing hor­ri­ble in Pun­jab, this episode haunts us.

Even if the SIT mem­ber Kun­war Vi­jay Par­tap Singh spoke about the pos­si­ble ac­cused in the Be­hbal Kalan fir­ing case to the me­dia, what wrong did he do? The com­plainant po­lit­i­cal party –the Shi­ro­mani Akali Dal has been cry­ing hoarse since its cul­pa­bil­ity has come to the fore, mak­ing in­sin­u­at­ing per­sonal re­marks about the up­right of­fi­cer. How did this es­cape the at­ten­tion of the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia?

 

I thought that as a Pun­jabi, you would be aware of the sen­si­tiv­ity of a case which in­volves the Sikhs and Guru Granth Sahib. The peo­ple of Pun­jab ex­pected that in such a sen­si­tive case, the ECI would seek a re­port from the gov­ern­ment of Pun­jab be­fore em­bark­ing on the route of re­moval of the SIT in­ves­ti­ga­tor in a heinous crime.

I am sure that you know that the Sikhs have the high­est re­gard for Guru Granth Sahib –revered as the Liv­ing Guru –World Teacher by the Sikhs.  Per­haps you also know that, since the last decade, in Pun­jab and around have thrived a group of thugs –with an avowed anti-Sikh agenda –roam­ing around the Malwa re­gion of Pun­jab, whose rapist-leader of the Sirsa Dera is on a long jail term. You must have not missed the story that when the fol­low­ers of this Dera in­dulged in sac­ri­lege of Guru Granth Sahib in 2015, Sikhs in Pun­jab be­came rest­less and protested. In Oc­to­ber 2015, when Sikhs were peace­fully demon­strat­ing at Be­hbal Kalan, Farid­kot, Pun­jab po­lice per­son­nel opened un­pro­voked, in­dis­crim­i­nate fir­ing and killed two pro­test­ers –Kr­is­han Bhag­wan Singh and Gur­jeet Singh Sarawa.

The gov­ern­ment of the day, presided over by Parkash Singh Badal and Sukhbir Singh Badal, whose party MP Naresh Gu­jral is the pre­sent com­plainant to the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion, did every­thing pos­si­ble to dis­miss the in­ci­dent –first at­tempt­ing to show it as an at­tack by the pro­test­ers, then set­ting up the Zora Singh Com­mis­sion but not re­leas­ing its re­port or act­ing upon its find­ings, et al. 

Ear­lier this year the mat­ter reached the Pun­jabi As­sem­bly, where af­ter dis­cus­sion of the Jus­tice Ran­jit Singh Com­mis­sion Re­port, a unan­i­mous res­o­lu­tion was passed to con­sti­tute the SIT, which was then done by the Pun­jab gov­ern­ment.

‘Such crass be­hav­iour of the ECI is yet an­other in­jus­tice to the Sikhs and we will not take this ly­ing down.’

Dal Khalsa

The vic­tim fam­i­lies in par­tic­u­lar and Sikh or­gan­i­sa­tions in gen­eral have been fol­low­ing the case on a reg­u­lar ba­sis and as a face of the SIT, Kun­war Vi­jay Par­tap Singh has been reg­u­larly brief­ing the me­dia for pur­poses of in­for­ma­tion and trans­parency.

Though be­lat­edly to­day, the Cap­tain Amarinder Singh gov­ern­ment has al­ready shot a mis­sive to you seek­ing re­ver­sal of the ECI de­ci­sion. It is in the fit­ness of things that the ECI should not stand on pres­tige and re­verse its il­le­gal or­der.

The vic­tim fam­i­lies, the Bar­gari Mor­cha, the var­i­ous po­lit­i­cal par­ties con­test­ing elec­tions in Pun­jab, re­li­gious or­gan­i­sa­tions other than those ow­ing al­le­giance to the Shi­ro­mani Akali Dal and its con­trolled bod­ies -the SGPC and DS­GMC, all have come on to the streets, protest­ing the move of the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion.

Dal Khalsa has said that ‘such crass be­hav­iour of the ECI is yet an­other in­jus­tice to the Sikhs and we will not take this ly­ing down.’ Sukhraj Singh –the son of mar­tyr Kr­is­han Bhag­wan Singh said, “I am deeply pained. I have been at­tend­ing al­most every hear­ing of the SIT with the hope that jus­tice will be done to our fam­ily. The ECI has de­railed jus­tice and this is un­fair, un­just and grossly par­tial.’ The Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia is likely to be flooded with more protests from Sikhs in Delhi and Chandi­garh.

‘The ECI’s in­de­pen­dence, fair­ness, im­par­tial­ity and ef­fi­ciency are per­ceived to be com­pro­mised to­day, thereby en­dan­ger­ing the in­tegrity of the elec­toral process which is the very foun­da­tion of In­dian democ­racy.”

Se­nior Bu­reau­crats in a let­ter to Pres­i­dent of In­dia

As you know, just a day back, a large group of se­nior for­mer bu­reau­crats have writ­ten to the Pres­i­dent of In­dia ques­tion­ing the in­tegrity of your Com­mis­sion, rais­ing per­ti­nent ques­tions re­gard­ing the clean chit given by the ECI to Prime Min­is­ter Modi and his party BJP, cit­ing many in­stances of trans­gres­sion of not only the Model Code of Con­duct but also time-tested norms of elec­tion­eer­ing and rule of law.

Their let­ter reads, ‘The ECI’s in­de­pen­dence, fair­ness, im­par­tial­ity and ef­fi­ciency are per­ceived to be com­pro­mised to­day, thereby en­dan­ger­ing the in­tegrity of the elec­toral process which is the very foun­da­tion of In­dian democ­racy.”

Sir, please pon­der:

1. The Chief Min­is­ter of UP Shri Adityanath Yogi, al­lud­ing to the In­dian army says, ‘Modi ki Sena.’ The ECI only asks him to be care­ful in fu­ture. Re­fer­ring to Mus­lims, to­day he re­port­edly said, “You have ‘Ali’, we have ‘Ba­jrang Bali”. Why does the ECI not stop him from cam­paign­ing? Tak­ing the sen­si­tiv­ity of the pre­sent sac­ri­lege case into ac­count, the ECI could have just asked the Pun­jab gov­ern­ment to ask Kun­war Vi­jay Par­tap Singh to re­frain from speak­ing to the me­dia till the elec­tions are over. Don’t you think that should have been suf­fi­cient? Did the ECI not jump the gun?
2. The in­cen­di­ary speeches by BJP and al­lied par­ties in Ma­ha­rash­tra and Ut­tar Pradesh should make the ECI sit up and take prompt no­tice. Why is it not be­ing done?
3. How on earth does the ECI al­low BJP’s deft ex­ploita­tion of some loop­hole in the rule book and force DTH sub­scribers to watch BJP’s chan­nel NAMO TV? Upon com­plaints, the ECI is sim­ply look­ing the other way as the pi­geon closes its eyes upon see­ing a cat.

“I am deeply pained. I have been at­tend­ing al­most every hear­ing of the SIT with the hope that jus­tice will be done to our fam­ily. The ECI has de­railed jus­tice and this is un­fair, un­just and grossly par­tial.’ 

Sukhraj Singh, son of mar­tyr Bhai Kr­is­han Bhag­wan Singh

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On a larger can­vas, Is it not dis­turb­ing the ECI that the Shi­ro­mani Akali Dal is con­test­ing the pre­sent gen­eral elec­tions as a Sikh re­li­gious body!  May I re­mind you that the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia has been pre­var­i­cat­ing about the re­li­gious/​po­lit­i­cal and re­li­gious/​sec­u­lar sta­tus of the Shi­ro­mani Akali Dal for the last 9 years? The Elec­tion Com­mis­sion is the main re­spon­dent in a case filed by a so­cial­ist ac­tivist in 2010 in the Delhi High Court but the ECI has not had the guts to pre­sent a clear note on this. How is it that in some cases it takes less than 9 days and in oth­ers, the case lingers on for 9 years and more?

The peo­ple of Pun­jab have no love lost for the Elec­tion Com­mis­sion of In­dia. We still re­mem­ber the dark night of 17 Sep­tem­ber 1991, when less than 10 hours be­fore the peo­ple of Pun­jab were to ex­er­cise their fran­chise, the then Chief Elec­tion Com­mis­sioner T. N. Se­shan, can­celled polls in Pun­jab, with­out as­sign­ing any rea­son what­so­ever. Every time the ECI does some­thing hor­ri­ble in Pun­jab, this episode haunts us.

Kun­war Vi­jay Par­tap Singh is work­ing with his back to the walls as a gen­uine po­lice of­fi­cer and af­ter a very long time, the peo­ple of Pun­jab are ral­ly­ing be­hind a po­lice of­fi­cer for his up­right­ness and hon­esty.  The ECI will do well to re­in­state him.

Sin­cerely

Jag­mo­han Singh
Ed­i­tor, The World Sikh News