Churches in Punjab float outfit, to fight Jalandhar bypoll

JALANDHAR: Various hurches have joined hands to form the United Punjab Party as a Christian voice in state politics, and besides contesting the Jalandhar parliamentary byelection, it will seek reservation for the Dalit converts.
The party was floated at a Christian gathering on April 3 at pastor Harpreet Deol's Jesus Healing Ministries at Khojewala village in Kapurthala district. Deol's Pentecostal Christian Parbandhak Committee (PCPC) is its main sponsor. Party's first president Albert Dua said: "We have decided to contest the Jalandhar byelection and our search for local candidate is on. From next week, our political work will also be visible."
He said: "Our aim is to build a base for Christian politics in Punjab, contest all elections in the state, and put up our own candidates on some assembly seats. On April 3, pastor Deol had clarified that he wasn't getting into politics and will continue his religious work. Deol and fellow prominent pastor Bajinder Singh had faced income tax raids on January 31.
Party president Dua claimed that Punjab's Catholics, Protestants, and Pentecostals had come together to oppose the "false propaganda against Christians", and even though PCPC was main sponsor, the party's representatives came from other groups also. "I am a Catholic myself," Dua said, claiming that the PCPC had formed on the lines of the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) of the Sikhs to streamline different churches and bring discipline among them.
Declaring that the party will demand reservation for the Christian Dalits, he said: "So far, those converting to Christianity kept their old religious and caste identities to claim the benefit of reservation, and now they will claim the same as Christians, whose unofficial number is 35 lakh." For now, members of the scheduled castes who become Christians come into the backwards classes in Punjab.
He claimed the party would also speak for other communities.