Re­spond­ing to the need of the Sikh San­gat of Ra­jouri Gar­den to en­list as vot­ers for the forth­com­ing DS­GMC elec­tions, the Sikh San­gat of the area, led by the Sikh Youth Foun­da­tion is en­gaged in a daily door to door cam­paign, not only urg­ing Sikh San­gat to reg­is­ter their votes but also en­abling them through the on­line and of­fline fill­ing of the rel­e­vant forms for reg­is­tra­tion of new votes, adding pho­tos of al­ready ex­ist­ing vot­ers as well as iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and dele­tion of bo­gus votes.

SINCE THE LAST WEEK, TEAMS OF AC­TIVISTS, ARMED WITH VOTER LISTS AND REL­E­VANT FORMS HAVE COV­ERED more than 400 fam­i­lies in a door-to-door cam­paign in­form­ing Sikh San­gat about the DS­GMC elec­tions and en­abling them to en­list as vot­ers. . Hun­dreds of forms have been dis­trib­uted and a tele­phone cam­paign is also on to touch base with young new vot­ers.

Speak­ing to WSN, leader of the Sikh Youth Foun­da­tion -Harneek Singh said, “We are clear that we should not lose the bat­tle by de­fault. No­body should. We will spare no ef­fort for one hun­dred per cent en­rol­ment of Sikh vot­ers in the Ra­jouri Gar­den con­stituency for the DS­GMC elec­tions. We were in­spired by the World Sikh News cam­paign for max­i­mum par­tic­i­pa­tion in the DS­GMC elec­tions. ”

“We are in­spired by the WSN cam­paign for voter aware­ness in the DS­GMC elec­tions. Our aim is 100 per cent par­tic­i­pa­tion by Ra­jouri Gar­den Sikh vot­ers.”

Harneek Singh, Leader, Sikh Youth Foun­da­tion

“Even though we are liv­ing here for decades, this cam­paign in the last few days has opened new vis­tas of in­for­ma­tion and ex­pe­ri­ence re­lat­ing to how the DS­GMC elec­tion process func­tions and the pit­falls which ham­per free and fair elec­tions,” he added.

This is a rare ven­ture in Sikh re­li­gious and po­lit­i­cal af­fairs. It is ex­tremely rare to see that those who are not con­test­ing elec­tions are en­gaged in the poll process per­suad­ing peo­ple to par­tic­i­pate.

“In the 2017 elec­tions, there were 10000 plus vot­ers in Ra­jouri Gar­den. It is our en­deav­our to touch the new youth who are el­i­gi­ble as vot­ers. We have a team of mo­ti­vated busi­ness­men and en­tre­pre­neurs who are spar­ing time and ef­fort in the in­ter­est of the Panth,” said Sukhbir Singh to WSN.

As Delhi is still in the spate of Covid19, ac­tivists were seen wear­ing masks, main­tain­ing so­cial dis­tance in their in­ter­ac­tion with prospec­tive vot­ers. “We are re­ally en­cour­aged and happy with the pos­i­tive re­sponse. The typ­i­cal warmth of tea and snacks was al­ways there, which oc­ca­sion we are us­ing to fur­ther em­power and in­spire them to reg­is­ter as vot­ers as well as to vote dur­ing the elec­tions,” said SYF leader Harneek Singh.

Nar­rat­ing his ex­pe­ri­ence, Amarpreet Singh, an­other ac­tivist speak­ing to WSN said, “One of the res­i­dents of Ra­jouri Gar­den stated that they have been liv­ing in Ra­jouri for the last 20 years but no one has ever ap­proached them to make them aware and en­cour­age them to par­tic­i­pate in Sikh Gur­d­wara Elec­tions. An­other lady said she has been ac­tive in the Gur­d­wara, how­ever, she is not aware of the process and was sur­prised that she too could cast her vote.”

“We are de­ter­mined to take this cam­paign right up to the vot­ing day. Ra­jouri Gar­den will be a shin­ing ex­am­ple of how San­gat should par­tic­i­pate in Delhi Gur­d­wara Elec­tions. We will en­sure full par­tic­i­pa­tion, zero tol­er­ance for bo­gus votes and stream­lin­ing of the processes by in­ter­act­ing with the Di­rec­torate of Gur­d­wara Elec­tions,” said Harneek Singh.

An old hand, who has been mon­i­tor­ing Gur­d­wara elec­tions for a long time, learn­ing about this ef­fort, said, “This is a much-needed cam­paign. It is a ray of hope in the all-round at­mos­phere of hope­less­ness and de­spair about Sikh re­li­gious and po­lit­i­cal ac­tivism.”

“I hope that this cam­paign is repli­cated in all the 46 wards of Delhi. It will surely be a har­bin­ger of change and de­moc­ra­ti­sa­tion of Gur­d­wara elec­tions.”

“I hope that this cam­paign is repli­cated in all the 46 wards of Delhi. It will surely be a har­bin­ger of change and de­moc­ra­ti­sa­tion of Gur­d­wara elec­tions. I am hope­ful that if the cam­paign is done in a sus­tained man­ner, the re­li­gio-po­lit­i­cal scene of Delhi will be dif­fer­ent in the times to come,” he said.