Synopsis
Sukhbir Singh Badal resigned as the leader of the Shiromani Akali Dal following the party’s poor showing in recent elections. Badal’s resignation, which came after calls from within the party for a change in leadership, sets the stage for a new party president to be chosen at a meeting on Monday.
PTIBowing to pressure from the party rank and file after the dismal performance of the party in the Assembly and Lok Sabha elections, Shiromani Akali Dal President and former Deputy Chief Minister of Punjab Sukhbir Singh Badal resigned as head of the party on Saturday. The party’s working committee will meet on Monday to elect a new leader.
Several top leaders of the party had been openly expressing their opposition to Badal’s continuance as SAD chief over the last few months. SAD leader and former Education Minister of Punjab Daljit S Cheema announced that Badal had submitted his resignation to the working Committee of the party to pave the way for the election of a new President.
“He (Badal) thanked all the party leaders & workers for expressing confidence in his leadership and extending wholehearted support & cooperation throughout the tenure… SAD Working Committee President S Balwinder S Bhundar has called an emergency meeting of the Working Committee of the party on November 18 at 12 o’ clock at the party headquarters office in Chandigarh. The committee will consider the resignation submitted by S Sukhbir S Badal & will decide further course of action…,” Cheema said on social media site X.
He further said that elections for the post of President, Office bearers & working committee of SAD are due on Dec 14, 2024 when five year term of the present team expires.
After the passing away of former Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal, his son Sukhbir had assumed the mantle but SAD’s fortunes dipped since he assumed office. SAD had quit the BJP-led NDA immediately after the three Farm Laws were passed in Parliament in September 2020, triggering a long-drawn agitation by farmers from Punjab against it. Though the Centre was forced to withdraw the three laws a year later, SAD and BJP had to bear the brunt of the move in the 2022 Punjab Assembly elections and the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Of the 13 Lok Sabha seats from Punjab, Sukhbir’s wife Harsimrat Kaur Badal- who contested from Bhatinda- was the only SAD candidate to win. In the 117-member Punjab Assembly, SAD has only 3 MLAs while its ally BSP had won one seat.
Former SAD MP Prem Singh Chandumajra, one of the vocal opponents of Sukhbir Badal in the party, said the demand for his resignation was being made as the party was going downhill under his leadership.
“We were demanding that Sukhbir Singh Badal should show his sacrifice. Under his leadership Akali Dal has weakened. The party did not even have four candidates to contest on four seats. Hence, we were demanding that if he resigns, it will pave the way for strengthening Akali Dal and bringing together the fractured party unit. Our youths are in jail, farmers are suffering and our part of Chandigarh is being given to Haryana. Punjab is in a bad shape now and the people here want a regional party like Akali Dal to become strong,” Chandumajra told a news agency.
He emphasised that Badal’s resignation has opened the path to integration of the Akali Dal whose unit is fragmented today.
On the future course of action, the leader said Akali Dal derives its power from the Akaal Thakht and the Jathedars (religious leaders) should find a leader who can strengthen the party.
Badal was made deputy CM by his father after SAD-BJP got the mandate again in August, 2009 and stayed in the post till the party was voted out in the 2017 elections by the Congress.
Badal was elected SAD president by the party on December 14, 2019, for five years and his term was to end next month. His elevation had led to resentment in the party and leaders SS Dhindsa and Sukhbir’s cousin Manpreet Singh Badal had quit SAD.
This would be for the first time in decades that SAD will not have anybody from the Badal family as the head of the party.
