COURTESY HT NOV 8

Ex-Akal Takht jathedar leads protest at Golden Temple against SGPC over missing saroops

Members of various Sikh organisations and political parties during a protest near the Golden Temple in Amritsar on Saturday. SAMEER SEHGAL/HT
HT Correspondent

letterschd@hindustantimes.com

AMRITSAR : Former Akal Takht jathedar Ranjit Singh on Saturday led a demonstration at the entrance plaza of the Golden Temple in Amritsar against the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) over the episode of missing 328 Guru Granth Sahib saroops and rare manuscripts of the Sikh Reference Library.

Hundreds of members of Sikh organisations and political parties gathered at Gurdwara Burj Akali Phoola Singh in support of the ex-jathedar and started a procession carrying banners against the gurdwara body that manages affairs of the Golden Temple and other major Sikh shrines in northern region of the country. The procession culminated at the Golden Temple with the demonstrators sitting at the plaza for more than three hours.

Addressing the gathering, the former head priest of the temporal seat said, “The Sikh community today wants to know where the SGPC sent the saroops missing from its records. Also, the SGPC failed to reveal the whereabouts of rare manuscripts of Guru Granth Sahib.”

Also, he dared the SGPC task force to evict the protesters.

He announced to wait for SGPC president Gobind Singh Longowal and Akal Takht acting jathedar Giani Harpreet Singh to get clarification on the issues. But when neither Longowal nor the jathedar turned up after a three-hour-long sit-in, Ranjit Singh said the next course of action will be announced soon to hold the SGPC accountable.