S. G. P. C.
                    

As has been explained in relation to the term mahant, the well-endowed Sikh historical shrines were wrested from the hands of these hereditary managers of the Sikh Gurdwaras through a Sikh upsurge, called the Akai Movement, during the twenties of this century. The Akali movement came to its logical conclusion in the year 1925 when the Punjab Government agreed to pass a statute for the management of Sikh historical shrines, called, he Sikh Gurdwaras Act. The Management Board set up under this Act is known as the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee or S.G.P.C. for short. Since this S.G.P.C. is elected on the adult Sikh suffrage, it has assumed the status of a nascent Sikh Parliament and as such it has presumed to act on a number of occasions to the great annoyance and sometimes general alarm of the Authority. During the last seven or eight years no new elections of the S.G.P.C. have been held and it has been publicly declared that the Government of India now contemplate splinting up the S.G.P.C. into three or four smaller Corporations for managing regional Sikh Gurdwaras so that the S.G.P.C. may be finally and formally shorn of its presumptions regarding its representative character qua the Sikh community as such.

 

 

 

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