The fault line beneath Punjab’s sacrilege row
How far should the state go in regulating matters of faith?
Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann is “anti-Guru”, the Akal Takht has declared. The top Sikh body’s accusation revolves around a still-contested viral video of alleged sacrilege, but the dispute runs deeper.
The controversy, which began in January, has caught fire nearly two months after the Punjab assembly passed its stringent anti-sacrilege law, prescribing life imprisonment and fines of up to 25 lakh rupees.
Since the law’s passage, the Akal Takht has called it “unacceptable” and “against the Guru Granth Sahib and the Sikh community”. It summoned the Punjab Assembly speaker, issued a 15-day ultimatum to amend the law, proposed a legal panel to hold discussions, and ultimately rejected it in public.
Mann, meanwhile, celebrated the law’s enactment with a statewide “Shukrana Yatra”, a thanksgiving procession that began months before Punjab heads to the polls in November. The chief minister and the Aam Aadmi Party have dismissed criticism of both the law and the sacrilege video controversy as political manipulation by the opposition Akali Dal.
But the law’s critics are not confined to the Akal Takht, legal experts and civil society have also critiqued it as “draconian”.
Enacted on April 20, the Jaagat Jot Sri Guru Granth Sahib Satkar (Amendment) Act, 2026, defines sacrilege as “any wilful and deliberate act, committed with the intent of desecration”, including the physical damage, defacement, burning, tearing or theft of the Guru Granth Sahib or any part of it.
It says sacrilege can also refer to “words, either spoken or written, or by signs or by visible representations or through electronic means or otherwise” that “hurt the religious feelings of persons professing the Sikh faith.”
The law prescribes at least seven years of imprisonment, extendable up to 20 years, with a fine ranging from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 10 lakh. In case of sacrilege as part of a conspiracy to “disrupt peace or communal harmony”, it outlines life imprisonment and fines up to 25 lakh rupees.
In addition, the law holds “custodians” of the Guru Granth Sahib – individuals, institutions or gurdwara committees formally entrusted with a copy – liable for up to five years’ imprisonment if they are found negligent in its care or fail to adhere to its religious code of conduct.
The law mandates that the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, an apex administrative body, maintain an encrypted registry to track every printed copy of the holy book through unique identification numbers and custodian details.
This creates fear among those possessing the holy book, said the Akal Takht. Meanwhile, legal experts pointed out that a naturally worn out copy of the holy book could also be used to make accusations of sacrilege to settle personal scores.
The Akal Takht has also expressed reservations over the use of the term ‘Saroop’ in the law, referring to a physical copy of the Guru Granth Sahib as a living Guru, instead of the commonly used “Bir”, meaning manuscript.
The religious body has said that the government “bypassed” the religious institutions while framing the law and whether an individual is following the religious code of conduct or not is only the Akal Takht’s jurisdiction and not the state. “The government has no authority to make such decisions.”
Between 2015 and April 2026, a total of 597 sacrilege cases were lodged in Punjab. Out of these 44 saw conviction and 99 ended in acquittal.
Before the AAP government, which had been deliberating on the anti-sacrilege law since last year, both the Shiromani Akali Dal and the Congress had pushed for it in 2016 and 2018, respectively.
In the past, sacrilege incidents in Punjab were investigated under the provisions of Section 299 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code. They dealt with “deliberate and malicious acts,” against all faiths and not only the Sikh religion.