Two Independent radical candidates, one of them locked up in an Assam jail under the National Security Act, on Tuesday won their constituencies in Punjab, evoking a radical wave.
In his first electoral contest, Sikh radical Amritpal Singh, head of ‘Waris Punjab De’ and currently behind bars under the National Security Act, won the Khadoor Sahib seat by 197,120 votes over his nearest rival, Congress candidate Kulbir Singh Zira.
While Amritpal Singh ended up with 404,4300 votes, Zira secured 207,310. Laljit Singh Bhullar of the Aam Aadmi Party was in third place with 194,836 votes. BJP’s Manjit Singh Manna was fifth with 86,373 votes, behind Virsa Singh Valtoha of the Shiromani Akali Dal with 86,416 votes.
For supporters and sympathisers, Amritpal Singh is the next-gen of Sikh ‘separatist leaders’ like Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, who was killed in the Indian Army’s Operation Blue Star in 1984. He also considers the late separatist an “inspiration” for him.
Amritpal Singh, a fiery pro-Khalistan propagator and self-styled preacher, had been running ‘separatist’ propaganda through speeches before going to jail.
On the radar of Central investigating agencies, he drew comparisons to Bhindranwale owing to his looks and donning a navy blue turban, a white chola and a sword-sized kirpan. However, unlike Bhindranwale, Amritpal Singh didn’t have any formal religious schooling. A dropout from a polytechnic, he cut his hair and shaved his beard while in Dubai. Police records say Amritpal Singh, who tied the knot with UK-based NRI Kirandeep Kaur in 2023, has been involved in scores of disputes, kidnappings and issuing threats.
Amritpal Singh, who hails from Jallupur Khera in Amritsar district, was not known till September 2022 when he returned to India from Dubai where he had been running his family’s transport business since 2012. After taking charge of ‘Waris Punjab De’, which means the heirs of Punjab, he was trying to position himself as a new fulcrum for the panthic cause by calling on the youth to “fight for the freedom” of the Panth.
‘Waris Punjab De’ was floated by lawyer-actor-turned-activist Deep Sidhu in 2021. One of the accused in Red Fort violence, Sidhu died in a road accident near Haryana’s Sonepat in February 2022.
In the Faridkot (reserved) seat, Sarabjit Singh Khalsa, the son of one of the assassins of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, won by 70,053 votes over his nearest rival, Karamjit Singh Anmol of the AAP. While Khalsa secured 298,062 votes, Anmol had 228,009 in his kitty. Amarjit Kaur Sahoke of the Congress was in third place with 160,357 votes.
BJP’s Hans Raj Hans was fifth with 123,533 votes.
In 2014 and 2009, Khalsa unsuccessfully contested the Lok Sabha poll from the Fatehgarh Sahib (reserved) and Bathinda seats, respectively. In 2019, he was the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) candidate.
Class 12 dropout Khalsa is the son of Beant Singh, one of the two assassinators of Indira Gandhi. Beant Singh and Satwant Singh, bodyguards of the PM, had killed her on October 31, 1984.
His mother, Bimal Kaur, and his grandfather, Sucha Singh, became the MPs from Ropar and Bathinda, respectively, in 1989.
