Balkaur Singh, father of late singer Sidhu Moose Wala, on Sunday joined Rahul Gandhi-led Bharat Jodo Yatra which is currently in Punjab. The padyatra resumed today from the Khalsa College Ground in Jalandhar after it was suspended for 24 hours in view of the death of Congress MP Santokh Singh Chaudhary.
76-years-old Chaudhary died on Saturday after suffering a cardiac arrest during the Bharat Jodo Yatra. He was cremated at his native Dhaliwal village in Jalandhar on Sunday.
The Wayanad MP offered prayers at Devi Talab temple in Jalandhar before the resumption of the march. As the march resumed around 3 pm, Balkaur Singh walked with Gandhi for some distance. Moose Wala was shot dead in Punjab’s Mansa district in May last year. He had contested the Punjab Assembly polls on a Congress ticket from Mansa but failed to win.
आज #BharatJodoYatra में प्रसिद्ध पंजाबी गायक स्वर्गीय सिद्धू मूसेवाला के पिता बलकौर सिंह सिद्धू जी ने @RahulGandhi जी के साथ कदम मिलाकर नफ़रत, डर और हिंसा फैलाने वाली ताकतों को मुंहतोड़ जवाब दिया।सिद्धू मूसेवाला की पंजाब के मानसा में दिनदहाड़े हत्या कर दी गई थी। pic.twitter.com/FnjwUIm6xa
— Congress (@INCIndia) January 15, 2023
Punjab Congress chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring, Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Partap Singh Bajwa, former chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi, MLA Pargat Singh and other party leaders took part in the march.
The Punjab leg of the march began on Wednesday from Sirhind in Fatehgarh Sahib. The yatra took a break on Friday in the wake of the Lohri festival.
The march, which started from Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu on September 7, will conclude in Srinagar by January 30. It has so far covered Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana.
Meanwhile, former Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal hailed the Bharat Jodo Yatra, saying Rahul Gandhi has been able to bring together disparate elements of society and make them realise how important it is to ensure unity in the country.
In an interview with PTI, Sibal, who quit the Congress last year, said the party’s Kanyakumari to Kashmir Yatra “optically” seems to have succeeded and gotten the support of non-Congress elements as well.
“I think that he (Rahul), during the course of his march, has been able to bring together disparate elements of society and make them realise how important it is to ensure unity in our country and that respect for diversity is at the heart of our nation moving forward,” the former Union minister said.
“Yes, Bharat Jodo Yatra is something that needs to be lauded. Now as far as its political impact is concerned, I think people are confusing the concept behind the yatra and relating it to a pure political act which I don’t think it is,” said Sibal.
He said what the yatra intends to do is to show to the people that there are two ideologies that they should choose from, with ‘Bharat Jodo’ being the one end of the spectrum as opposed to the other end “which we all know is represented by whom”.
(With PTI inputs)
Read all the Latest Politics News here
Comments
0 comment