Bathinda: The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on Friday stated that Bhagwant Mann was “getting entangled in his web of lies” with his old associate Jagman Samra exposing him even further by providing details of additional sacrilegious conduct of the chief minister.Speaking to the media persons, the five-member committee of the SAD, which visited gurdwaras near Moga, stated that besides Jagman Samra, the CM’s former wife had also hinted that Bhagwant Mann committed further sacrilege by parodying the Sikh ‘ardas’. “This, if true, will be intolerable to the Sikh sangat,” the committee members asserted.Senior SAD functionary Balwinder Singh Bhunder said the CM was uttering one lie after another to defend his first lie. “First, the CM said the video in which he was seen committing sacrilege against the Guru Sahiban was a result of artificial intelligence. When this was disproved, Bhagwant Mann said the person in the video is not me. Now, he is claiming that a mask has been used to make his likeness in the video.”Bhunder said the latest theory was another attempt to confuse the Sikh sangat. “This will not work as people have realised that the chief minister has not only committed grave sins but is compounding them by getting into a confrontation with the Akal Takht,” he said.The Akali Dal representative disclosed that the five-member committee was visiting ‘mahapurkhs’ (religious personalities) across the state to apprise them about the sins of “Panth Doshi and Panth Dokhi” Bhagwant Mann, and appealing to them to come on one platform to oppose the latter.He said the committee was receiving a tremendous response from the Sikh sangat, which was in a state of shock over the blasphemous activities of the CM. Bhunder also made it clear that there was no politics behind the outreach programme of the SAD and that this was being done in panthic interest.Cheema condemns Maharashtra govtDaljit Singh Cheema, a senior SAD functionary, condemned the Maharashtra govt for repealing the seven-decade-old Act governing the Takht Sri Hazur Sahib and replacing it with a new law which seeks to place govt nominees on the board and take over its management.Cheema, who is part of the five-member Akali Dal panel, said such attempts had been made earlier also and resisted vigorously by the SGPC, the SAD and even the Hazuri Sachkhand Diwan. “We will continue to resist this,” he said.Other members of the committee, Maheshinder Singh Grewal, Gulzar Singh Ranike and Amarjit Singh Chawla, were also present.
