Akali Dal rumblings over Lok Sabha poll rout intensify after Sukhbir Badal’s flip-flop over Amritpal row

Last week, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal condemned the extension of Amritpal Singh’s detention under the National Security Act (NSA) by one year. The radical preacher Amritpal recently won the Khadoor Sahib Lok Sabha seat as an Independent while being in Dibrugarh jail in Assam.

Badal stated on X: “I and my party strongly oppose the extension of the NSA against Bhai Amritpal Singh, as this is a violation of the Constitution and of human rights. This decision of Bhagwant Mann (Chief Minister of Punjab) has fully exposed his anti-Sikh and anti-Punjab face, and shown how he dances to Delhi’s tunes. Our differences of ideology with Bhai Amritpal Singh apart, we will oppose repression and injustice against him or against anyone else, and we don’t care what political cost we have to pay for this. These are the principles which the Great Guru Sahiban has taught us.”

He also said, “Akali Dal is fully committed to the atmosphere of peace and communal harmony in the state and will continue to lead the efforts to preserve it. At the same time, we are equally and firmly opposed to repressive black laws like the NSA and the UAPA. Black laws are unacceptable.”

Badal has however drawn flak from various quarters, including from a section of his own party, over his “political opportunism”, with many asking him why he had fielded an Akali candidate against Amritpal in the Lok Sabha poll. Even his former political advisor Charanjit Singh Brar, a senior SAD leader, said, “The Shiromani Akali Dal shouldn’t have fielded candidates against Amritpal Singh from Khadoor Sahib and Sarabjeet Singh Khalsa (son of Indira Gandhi assassin Beant Singh) from Faridkot.”

Brar said, “In 1989, when Sarabjeet Singh Khalsa’s mother Bimal