February 5, 2015 by admin

SGPC fails to restart music academy

Fatehgarh Sahib, The Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) has failed to restart a music academy at Hargana village that has been lying closed for the past 50 years.
The villagers urged the SGPC to take over the academy. At a function on October 23, 2013, SGPC president Avtar Singh Makkar assured villagers that the academy would be restarted by appointing a music professor.
The local gurdwara managing committee offered two rooms to run the academy. The SGPC president’s assurance raised a ray of hope among the villagers that the young generation in and around the village would soon start getting lessons in music at the academy. Their hopes were, however, dashed to the ground as the SGPC failed to depute a music professor, provide musical instruments and arrange other infrastructure.
In the past, the academy produced famous “dhadhi jathas” of Ustad Tara Singh, Jaswant Singh Bhanwra, Ustad Sagar Mastana and others. However, the academy was later closed down due to various reasons, including the shortage of funds.
The president of the gurdwara management committee said SGPC officials had visited the village twice during the past one year. They demanded one acre land from the gurdwara management. They said the SGPC would spend Rs 2 crore for establishing the academy. After that, neither the SGPC president Makkar contacted them nor did he depute any professor for the academy. He demanded that the SGPC should fulfil the promise by restarting the academy at the earliest.