Amid the fer­vour of the Ra­jasthan As­sem­bly elec­tions, the Sikh com­mu­nity of Ti­jara stands at a cross­roads fol­low­ing the in­cen­di­ary re­marks made by BJP leader Sandeep Dayama. The of­fen­sive com­ments, tar­get­ing the revered in­sti­tu­tions of the Sikh and Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties, have sparked wide­spread out­rage. WSN Spe­cial Cor­re­spon­dent Ka­mal­jeet Singh vis­its the con­stituency days prior to the polls to file this re­port.

With Sikhs con­sti­tut­ing less than 1 mil­lion in Ra­jash­tan and ac­count­ing for 1.27 per­cent of the state’s pop­u­la­tion, a united vote for or against a po­lit­i­cal party is the only way for their voice to be heard. Oth­er­wise, his­tory will be re­peated. It can take months and years for the ma­jor po­lit­i­cal par­ties to even ap­point mem­bers of the State Mi­nori­ties Com­mis­sion.

This elec­tion emerges as a piv­otal mo­ment for the Sikh com­mu­nity to gal­va­nize and cul­ti­vate ro­bust lead­er­ship that re­flects their ethos and as­pi­ra­tions, tran­scend­ing be­yond mere to­kenism to ac­tive par­tic­i­pa­tion in the state’s de­mo­c­ra­tic processes. It’s a clar­ion call for Sikhs and other mi­nori­ties to rise and lead, en­sur­ing that their voices are not just heard but are in­flu­en­tial in shap­ing the fu­ture of Ra­jasthan.

The reper­cus­sions in the Sikh and Mus­lim-dom­i­nated Ti­jara con­stituency are pal­pa­ble as the Sikh can­di­date, Nir­mal Singh Khalsa of the Aam Aadmi Pari­wartan Party, chal­lenges the sta­tus quo. The Con­gress party, the SGPC, and Sikhs across the coun­try have con­demned the hate speech of the BJP leader lead­ing to his ex­pul­sion from the pri­mary mem­ber­ship of the party.

Nir­mal Singh Khalsa, in a pas­sion­ate re­buke, has dis­missed Daya­ma’s state­ments as cow­ardly and deroga­tory, es­pe­cially to­wards the Sikh Gur­d­waras in Ti­jara, Ra­jasthan. “Politi­cians like Sandeep Dayama are like a stain on the po­lit­i­cal fab­ric. We aim to erad­i­cate such di­vi­sive pol­i­tics that tar­nish the in­tegrity of our com­mu­nity,” Khalsa af­firmed, call­ing upon the Sikh com­mu­nity to stand united against such bla­tant at­tacks.

De­spite Daya­ma’s pub­lic apol­ogy, his photo op in Gur­d­waras seek­ing par­don failed to res­onate with the com­mu­nity in the con­stituency and else­where. Khalsa said, “The Sikh com­mu­nity does­n’t ac­cept Daya­ma’s apol­ogy. His dual stance, ask­ing for­give­ness from Sikhs while tar­get­ing Mus­lims, is un­ac­cept­able to us.”

Waryam Singh, an Al­war-based Sikh ac­tivist, stresses the same, con­demn­ing the du­al­ity of Daya­ma’s ac­tions. He in­sists that an apol­ogy at Akal Takht, the supreme re­li­gious au­thor­ity of Sikhs, is es­sen­tial, as mere words are not enough to heal the wounds in­flicted.

Gan­gana­gar which has a size­able pop­u­la­tion of Sikhs is the hub of Sikh so­cial, re­li­gious, and po­lit­i­cal ac­tiv­ity. Many Sikh bod­ies there con­tinue to up­hold Sikh rights at all lev­els.

Tejin­der Pal Singh Timma, Con­venor of the Sikh Ad­vi­sory Board from Gan­gana­gar, while speak­ing to this re­porter said, “We are cam­paign­ing against the Bharatiya Janata Party and are ap­peal­ing to the elec­torate in gen­eral and the Sikhs in par­tic­u­lar to vote against the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Speak­ing on the Ti­jara is­sue, he said, “We have sub­mit­ted our mem­o­ran­dum to the gov­ern­ment de­mand­ing ac­tion not only against the per­pe­tra­tor but also against the can­di­date Baba Balak Nath Yogi and UP Chief Min­is­ter Adityanath Yogi who clapped when Sandeep Dayama was spew­ing venom against Sikh Gur­d­waras and Mus­lim Masjids.”

The Sikh youth of Al­war share a unan­i­mous sen­ti­ment, vow­ing to sup­port Khalsa and re­ject Daya­ma’s di­vi­sive rhetoric. They see the de­feat of the BJP’s can­di­date as a win for their com­mu­ni­ty’s dig­nity and val­ues.

This elec­tion is not merely about a seat in the as­sem­bly; it is about chal­leng­ing the agents of ha­tred and stand­ing up for mi­nor­ity rights. The Sik­li­gar Sikhs, size­able in num­ber in Ra­jasthan, though scat­tered across the state, while speak­ing to this cor­re­spon­dent said, “We ap­peal to the Sikh vot­ers in Ti­jara and across Ra­jasthan to ex­er­cise their vote as a de­c­la­ra­tion of unity and re­sis­tance against big­otry.”

It must be men­tioned here that while he has ten­dered an un­qual­i­fied apol­ogy to the Sikhs while speak­ing to the me­dia,  he blurted out that “ac­tu­ally in­stead of Gur­d­waras, I wanted to say, ‘Madras­sas’.”  Can any­thing be more shame­ful than this?

Ac­tivists of Sikh Sud­har La­har Al­war, while speak­ing to WSN said, “We have many un­re­solved is­sues -our sta­tus, fa­cil­i­ties for ed­u­ca­tion and em­pow­er­ment are needed and we will con­tinue to voice our con­cerns so that our be­lea­guered Sik­li­gar com­mu­nity can take ben­e­fits of gov­ern­men­tal schemes.”

Paramjit Singh Rand­hawa was ap­pointed as the first chair­man of the Guru Nanak Dev Sikh Wel­fare Board es­tab­lished by the Con­gress state gov­ern­ment barely a few months prior to the polls.  There are Sikh lead­ers within the BJP too at pretty good po­si­tions but they have been side­lined dur­ing the elec­tions.

It must be em­pha­sized that Ra­jasthan’s po­lit­i­cal ta­pes­try shows a stark lack of Sikh rep­re­sen­ta­tion, de­spite a size­able pop­u­la­tion and over­whelm­ing pres­ence in some con­stituen­cies, that could in­flu­ence elec­toral out­comes.