NEW DELHI: The horrors of the 1984 Anti-Sikh riots in Delhi remain fresh and unmottled in her memory. Recounting those days, BJP MCD election candidate Paramjeet Kaur said that she was just eight years old when rioters attacked her house located in Mangolpuri precincts.
More than thirty-five years later, Kaur is in poll fray for the Delhi civic elections from the Khyala ward of Tilak Nagar, home of the Sikhs who migrated from Pakistan during the partition. “Anti-Sikh protesters looted my home and killed my uncle in 1984. I recognised my uncle’s body by looking at his footwear. I’m still terrified when I think back to the day the massacre happened,” said Kaur with a tinge of sadness in her tone.
Kaur, who attended an MCD school until third grade, claimed that after the riots her family moved to Rajasthan and she was unable to finish her education. Kaur earns her bread by teaching sewing lesson in her neighbourhood. “After my wedding, I moved to Khyala in Tilak Nagar along with my husband,” she said. Kaur, a single mother, has been with the BJP since 2019.
She started her political journey as a member of the Mahila Morcha wing of the BJP and after consistently being active in her neighbourhood. In this election, Kaur said, she has been pushing for car parking woes, corruption, old-age pension and so on. Sikh voters in Delhi have a significant role in approximately ten wards. The national capital is home to around five lakh Sikh and two lakh Punjabi voters. In a bid to woo Sikh voters, the party has given tickets to eight Sikhs in corporate elections. Adding to this Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee has also extended its support to the party