Chandigarh, Jul 28 (IANS): Shiromani Akali Dal President Sukhbir Badal on Friday said that no interference in the religious affairs of the Sikhs would be tolerated and the Khalsa Panth will give a befitting response to Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann’s brazen attempts to usurp control of sacred Sikh institutions through the backdoor.

“He’s walking the path of several anti-Sikh tyrants and their stooges in the past who tried to brow beat the Khalsa Panth and its sacred religious institutions,” Badal said in a statement.

“Clearly, he has had no time from his leisure and pleasure style in life to learn or draw the right lessons from Sikh history,” said the Akali Dal chief.

“Having failed to brow beat the Khalsa Panth on the issue of telecast of Gurbani, Bhagwant Mann is now resorting to cheap tricks and conspiracies to disrupt the smooth ‘seva’ being performed by the SGPC and its ‘sevadars’ and employees.

“He has lowered the dignity of his office so pathetically that he is now stooping even to incite and sponsor employees of Sach Khand Sri Harmandar Sahib, and going out of his way to register a union which he has himself sponsored by misleading a fragment of the employees of the SGPC,” said Badal.

He said the government-sponsored union “is Bhagwant Mann’s latest and desperate act of shameless interference in the affairs of a religion of which he does not observe even the basic norms.”

The SAD chief said since becoming the Chief Minister, Mann has remained obsessed with interfering in Sikh religious affairs and trying to weaken the established Sikh traditions and institutions.

“He or the Punjab government has no locus standi in recommending amendments to the Anand Marriage Act and yet he tried to hurriedly to poke his nose into it in a failed bid to tweak it at the bidding of his non-Sikh and anti-Sikh bosses in Delhi. These amendments can be made only on the recommendations of the elected religious representatives,” Badal added.