Even as the sitting Congress legislator Manpreet Singh Badal is striving for his sixth win as a legislator, it is the first time that the Bathinda (urban) assembly constituency is witnessing a four-corner contest.
In what could snowball into a major political controversy before the assembly polls in Punjab, Justice Ranjit Singh (retd), who headed the commission into the alleged incidents of sacrilege of Sri Guru Granth Sahib and the subsequent police .
The victims' families, along with Sikh religious groups and activists, relaunched an indefinite dharna on December 16 at Behbal Kalan, demanding justice.
Mainstream political parties and Sikh scholars seem unwilling to upset public sentiment, which appears to forgive murders and justify them because of anger against sacrilege.