How Akalis buried Udta Punjab past with Diljit Dosanjh
A rare phenomenon unfolded when Punjabi pop star and actor Diljit Dosanjh arrived at a historical gurdwara in Delhi on Tuesday (March 20).
A close lieutenant of the Badals, Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) president Manjit Singh GK swiftly stole the show as TV cameras rolled and devotees streamed the celebrity's visit live on Facebook.
Udta Punjab dented Akali popularity before polls
Remember, Dosanjh played a police officer in Anurag Kashyap's Udta Punjab that brought the state's drug problem under international spotlight.
The movie heavily dented the then ruling Shiromani Akali Dal's reputation barely months ahead of the Assembly elections that brought about the party's fall, its worst ever.
No Akali puritanism for trimmed-beard Sikh star
GK also risked his standing in Sikh politics when he took Dosanjh on a guided tour of the complex. The risk lay in extending a religious platform to a Sikh man with trimmed beard and presenting him with mementoes.
The DSGMC chief first walked Dosanjh to an open-air 1984 memorial and then held a joint news conference in a large committee hall to promote his upcoming film, Sajjan Singh Rangroot.
Per tradition, Sikh religious administrations, be it the DSGMC in Delhi or the SGPC in Amritsar, can very well honour non-Sikh celebrities and dignitaries during their visits to sacred shrines but not Sikhs with shorn hair or beard.
Courting controversy for bigger objective
Critics pounced on GK in no time. "Dosanjh could be a fine actor, but he certainly has a long way to go in order to receive honours by elected representatives of the Sikh faith. He has compromised his identity. And GK has compromised the stature of Sikh religious institutions," retorted Paramjit Singh Sarna, a fierce opponent of the Badals.
Bobby Sing, a film critic and author, also slammed the DSGMC, saying it tried to promote Dosanjh as a community icon.
The DSGMC, he wrote in a blog, and its "top-most office bearers have had a press conference with the famous Diljit Dosanjh having a severely trimmed beard, promoting him as the new Sikh youth icon without any guilt or shame. Now, if that doesn't give you the real identity of this new-age religious leadership, I don't know what else will."
Born in a political family, GK carved out a place for himself in community affairs at a relatively young age.
It would be naive to assume he didn't foresee brickbats coming in before hobnobbing with Dosanjh.
Still, he went ahead in person to give an overwhelming welcome to the highly popular Punjabi singer-actor.
With Dosanjh sitting beside, GK spoke longer than the star or his producers at the news conference. His turned out to be a speech on Sikh valour during world wars.
Around 1.2 million Indians volunteered to fight for the British Indian army in WWI, among them 22 per cent were Sikhs.
Historical records suggest more than 83,000 Sikhs were killed and over 100,000 wounded fighting the allied forces in World War I and II.
GK used the occasion to put a spotlight on the community's rich military legacy.
The timing was key. The DSGMC leader, also president of the Shiromani Akali Dal's Delhi unit, mounted a never-before attack last month on the Modi government for its cold-shouldering of visiting Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau.
It was a no-holds-barred outburst from a Badal loyalist, who minced no words in suggesting the snub stemmed more from growing discomfort with the Sikhs' rising political clout in Canada than anything else.
As I mentioned in my previous article, let's not construe the DSGMC president's forceful commentary as a telltale sign of the SAD and the BJP parting company. This alliance is firmly entrenched in Indian state's interests in Punjab and its demography. The partnership runs beyond regular politics.
That said, when GK courted controversy by virtually co-opting Diljit Dosanjh and his yet-to-be-released Sajjan Singh Rangroot, his appeared to be a calculative move.
The Akali leader rose above the Udta Punjab past and puritanism. Rather, he harnessed the star-studded moment to remind the world outside not to get swayed by state propaganda against the Sikhs.
During Trudeau's visit, negative headlines about the community spread like an infection from New Delhi to Europe and to as far as Canada. Overnight, the Sikhs, especially diasporic, found the Khalistani albatross around their neck.
History as powerful antidote to sectarian politics
The Delhi Akali head has delivered a powerful antidote to the right wing's spiteful anti-minority campaigns.
He illustrated how dissemination of your own history and culture at every forum could be an effective counteragent against ultra-nationalist forces out to homogenise - or else ostracise - multiculturalism.
"Let's look at the bigger picture. It's not about one movie or one star. The issue at hand is not about puritanism. It's about assertion. Manjit Singh GK struck the right chord by invoking Sikh history while sitting with a popular actor. The rest is secondary," explained political analyst Jaspal Singh Sidhu. "The Scots and the British were partners in their empire. But the Scots never forsake their identity."
For now, the Badal loyalist has showed the way. If coalition is compulsion, identity assertion is an instrument of survival, more so if coalition politics is dominated by the far-right.
Apparently stifled under a majoritarian leadership, the Akalis seem to have realised they would jeopardise their own existence if they failed to call a spade a spade.
They may not walk out of the BJP-led NDA, but they are taking baby steps to protect the goodwill of their core constituency. Using history and celebrities to send the message out might work well in the longer run.