A Nihang order’s blue-robed sevadar allegedly attacked Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) chief Sukhbir Singh Badal with a kirpan at a Nanded gurdwara in Maharashtra on Thursday — the second attempt on his life in under two years, and one that reopened a decade-old rupture between the Badal family and sections of the Sikh Panth.
As Badal was walking through the foot-washing area, the man, pretending to be a devotee, launched an attack on him, aiming for his chest. The attack drew swift condemnation across the political spectrum, and from the Akal Takht and the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC). The pardon was withdrawn within weeks after fierce opposition from the community. Days later, the discovery of torn pages of the Guru Granth Sahib – the Sikh scripture – followed by police firing on protesters in Faridkot hardened public anger. The slide has continued since. Former Deputy Chief Minister of Punjab, Badal, took the blow on his forearm and suffered injuries to his hand. He, the attacker, is Jaspal Singh Teja Singh Aidal, a lawyer from Pune. Over the years, Singh has tried several occupations, including running a small newspaper and operating a snacks centre in Camp for around three years. His wife works as a teacher at an English-medium school in Camp, while their daughter lives with her family in Pune’s Lullanagar.
Much of it goes back to the SAD-BJP government’s 2007-17 tenure in Punjab. The 2007 Dera Sacha Sauda controversy, in which Dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was accused of imitating Guru Gobind Singh’s attire, triggered protests that the Akal Takht briefly tried to defuse in September 2015 by pardoning him. Those controversies are widely credited with the SAD’s collapse in the 2017 Punjab election, where the party fell from ruling the government to 15 seats in the state’s 117 assembly seats. SAD won just three seats in 2022, and it currently has a single MLA and MP each. The SAD’s own post-2022 review acknowledged the party’s unpopularity.
Nanded police said Singh had repeatedly claimed he acted on “an order from waheguru”, though he first told officers he was angry over Punjab ’s drugs problem. Police said they had found no gang or criminal history linked to him so far. Jathedar Giani Kuldip Singh Gargaj said “a person who commits such an act cannot be a Sikh”, and SGPC chief Harjinder Singh Dhami called the attack “a direct insult to the honour and sanctity of the Guru’s house”. AAP leader Baltej Pannu, condemning the attack too, noted that resentment over unresolved 2015 sacrilege cases remained “ alive in the minds of Sikhs even today ”. The tradition traces to Guru Gobind Singh, who is said to have dressed one of his sons in blue battle attire, fixing the colour as the order’s visual marker ever since. Critics have long accused the then SAD-BJP government of mishandling the response and failing to bring those responsible for the “sacrilege” to justice. A 13-member panel that toured Punjab produced a 20-page report with 42 recommendations, including seeking forgiveness from the Akal Takht and the Panth, keeping distance from deras, reconnecting with ragis, granthis and pathis, and pursuing “Panthic unity”, among other measures — an implicit admission that rebuilding the party meant rebuilding trust with the religious community first. Earlier reporting noted: According to the police sources, Singh lived alone in Nanded while his family remained in Pune.
Earlier reporting noted: He concealed a kirpan, a small knife, in a large handkerchief and approached Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) chief Sukhbir Singh Badal, who was exiting Gurudwara Mata Sahib in Nanded, Maharashtra. Earlier reporting noted: A native of Pune, Singh has spent much of his life in the Camp area. He holds degrees in commerce and law and previously practised as a lawyer.
