Punjab Polls: Pro-Khalistan party candidate says 'women free to wear hijab'

Far and beyond Karnataka, the hijab row resonated in a nondescript assembly segment in the Sikh dominated poll-bound state.

An octogenarian radical voice, former IPS officer Simranjit Singh Mann in the fray from Amargarh constituency in Punjab’s Malerkotla, struck a note when he photographed himself with little girls of village Mandiala wearing a hijab.

While no other leader in Punjab across party lines, even at the peak of hectic campaigning, touched upon the hijab row, Mann altered the narrative imploring to follow the doctrine of Sikhism that allows full religious freedom. He asked Karnataka Muslims to visit Punjab to assert and practice religious freedom as per the Constitution.

Mann’s party, the SAD (Amritsar), is the lone party that ideologically still believes and contests elections with the demand for a separate Khalistan.

Also read: As Punjab goes to vote, will AAP be the gamechanger?

The constituency of Amargarh from where Mann is contesting has found prominence in this election for a few reasons. The Khalistan narrative still lives on in this constituency and in some minuscule parts of Punjab.

Actor-turned activist Deep Sidhu, who grabbed the headlines last year after he claimed responsibility for hoisting the Nishan Sahib (Sikh flag) at the Red Fort on Republic Day 2021, was actively campaigning for Mann. Deep, who was arrested and sent to jail for his act, was killed in a road accident a few days ago.

Campaigning for Mann, Deep’s video went viral when he held a broom (AAP poll symbol) and a sword (kirpan, a symbol of Sikh faith) in both hands and asked people if they would choose anything other than a kirpan.

Mann’s ideological differences with mainstream parties notwithstanding, his posturing on the hijab commotion in Karnataka, has found appeal in Amargarh in Muslim dominated Malerkotla.

“I lose the elections because people do not vote for me,” Mann said. His party has fielded some 86-odd candidates for the upcoming elections, a number much higher than last elections.

Mann’s party touched the zenith once in 1989 in the Lok Sabha elections when it won six of the 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab. Mann, who was in jail when elections took place, won his seat and became an MP for the first time. But, in 2017 the SAD (Amritsar) vote share was reduced to even lower than NOTA (0.7%).

Mann was again elected an MP from Sangrur in the 1999 general elections. The party has no notable presence in Punjab, yet Mann secured a little more than 48,000 votes from Sangrur in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, a seat won by AAP’s Bhagwant Mann, who is now the party’s CM candidate for the February 20 poll.

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