For the last 270 days, a 42-year-old has remained stationed atop a 400-foot BSNL tower in Punjab’s Samana. Efforts on part of the locals and government have failed to bring Gurjeet Singh Khalsa down from his perch. A resident of Kheri Nagaian village in Patiala, Khalsa is demanding a stringent law to punish sacrilege of holy scriptures across all faiths and has refused to come down till such a legislation is enacted.
The rare and physically punishing protest has drawn top officials and politicians, including from the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), to the otherwise quiet trading town of Samana. On June 28, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann had said that his government will bring a law for stricter punishment for sacrilege acts. He announced the move after holding a meeting with representatives of the ‘Sarb Dharam Beadbi Rokko Kanoon Morcha’. Khalsa leads the Morcha.
The Punjab government later called a special two-day session of the Vidhan Sabha on July 10 and 11. It was widely speculated that the government will table a Bill for harsher punishment against the sacrilege acts. Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema, on Monday, however said that a panel of legal experts were being consulted over framing it. “The law will ensure that no person dares to indulge in sacrilege. Our work (on framing the legislation) is not finished yet. When the draft is completely ready, we will share,” he had said while speaking to reporters after a Cabinet meeting.
To another question on when the said Bill will be tabled, Cheema said, “If need be, we will extend it (session) or convene another one after 10 days. We are not in a hurry”.
Incidentally, even before the Council of Ministers met Monday, the Morcha had issued a statement thanking the CM for tabling the Bill in the Cabinet. With Cabinet not even discussing the draft of the Bill, the Morcha withdrew its statement.
Meanwhile, Khalsa’s method is unprecedented. Punjab, however, has had a history of protesters scaling tall structures. Teachers have previously climbed water tanks in places like Mohali, Patiala, Muktsar and Kharar to press their demands. During former chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh’s tenure, such incidents were so frequent that security was deployed around tanks and mobile towers to prevent them being used as protest sites. On September 6, 2019, TET-qualified teachers descended only after talks with the then education secretary. The run-up to the 2017 Assembly elections also saw a spate of protests, almost always by ad hoc teachers, including once atop a telecom tower near the Punjab Bhawan in Chandigarh.
On January 10, 2023, four physical education teachers climbed a tank in Mohali, and were regularised soon after. Last year, a protester climbed atop a 50-foot-high telecom tower near the bus stand in Sector 17, Chandigarh, and demanded that the police call Punjab CM Mann. He was eventually brought down by firemen after five hours.
However, never before has a BSNL tower been used for protest. “Let us see what happens tomorrow (July 10),” said Gurpreet Singh, convener of a Sikh rights organisation called Atthe Pehar Tehal Sewa (to serve the Guru Granth Sahib, 24X7). “We want the tower to be remembered as the ‘Tower of Faith’. But we are worried, any delay can turn it into a 400-foot-high deathbed. Khalsa’s medical condition is critical,” he added.
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Khalsa climbed the tower on October 12 last year, armed with a blanket and his licensed pistol. He has not come down since. Neither police nor civil officials have been able to reach him. Khalsa has threatened to fire at anyone who tries to approach, before turning the gun on himself.
A dairy owner with 50 cattle, a family, including a son, and an SUV, Khalsa’s act stems from personal anguish. “He could not bear repeated incidents of sacrilege. His mother told me he once injured himself by banging his head against a wall after hearing of a juvenile urinating on the Guru Granth Sahib in Jandiala,” said Gurpreet Singh.
Supporters have set up a shelter beneath the tower and maintain a round-the-clock vigil. “Three youths go up daily with liquids and charging packs,” said Gurpreet. “He hasn’t eaten solids since January 11. He can no longer stand. His clothes are brought down, washed and sent back. There is no toilet, waste is brought down in garbage bags.”
Khalsa has been reporting bleeding from the rectum, and tested positive for typhoid last month. A lab technician climbs up daily to collect samples, and he is now being massaged regularly to enable him to climb down safely if the proposed Bill is passed.
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Khalsa’s protest stems from widespread anger over a series of sacrilege incidents in Punjab since 2015, starting with the desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib in Bargari. The state has seen sporadic incidents ever since, with protestors accusing successive governments of failing to deliver a strong, enforceable law.
Lawyers including KS Boparai, Jagnahar Singh and HS Pannu have been working with the protesters to draft the legislation. “We have given the draft, The Punjab Prevention of Offences against Holy Scriptures Act, 2025, to the government,” said Gurpreet. “ADGP LK Yadav and AAP state chief and Cabinet minister Aman Arora met us. But the government has not tabled the Bill yet. Finance Minister Harpal Cheema even claimed the draft wasn’t prepared, even though we handed it over. The Cabinet was to take it up on July 7, but it didn’t happen.”
With the special session set to begin Thursday, Khalsa has sent word that he will shoot himself on July 12 if the Vidhan Sabha does not pass the Bill.
“You can see the tower from a distance,” said Sant Ram, a shopkeeper near the Samana administrative complex. “People say an agitator is up there. Because of him, so many officers and politicians have visited us.”
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Earlier, while taking about the proposed legislation, Mann had expressed concern over existing legal loopholes that allow individuals guilty of sacrilege to walk free, calling it completely unwarranted and unacceptable. He had said that while the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) provides clear provisions regarding religious places, it remains silent on holy ‘granths’.
It, however, is not the first time that a law will be brought for stricter punishment for sacrilege. During the SAD-BJP tenure in 2016, the Vidhan Sabha had passed the Indian Penal Code (Punjab Amendment) Bill, 2016 and CrPC (Punjab Amendment) Bill, 2016 recommending life sentence for sacrilege against Guru Granth Sahib. The Centre later returned the bill.
Later, during the Congress rule in 2018, the House passed two Bills — the Indian Penal Code (Punjab Amendment) Bill, 2018, and the Code of Criminal Procedure (Punjab Amendment) Bill 2018, which stipulated a punishment of up to life imprisonment for injury, damage or sacrilege to Guru Granth Sahib, Bhagavad Gita, Quran and the Bible. However, the President did not give assent to these two Bills.
