Tanvi Sinha
The Supreme court on 12th January, 2021 issued notices to the Centre and State for a response based on the petition filed by the All India Shiromani Singh Sabha.
The petition sought a uniform policy on public holidays.
The three-judge bench of CJI S.A Bobde, Justice A.S Bopanna, and Justice V. Ramasubramanian were looking into the matter.
The petition filed by the All India Shiromani Singh Sabha was on the basis of the absence of any national declaration of a holiday for the birth anniversary of the 10th Sikh Guru, Guru Gobind Singh.
Guru Gobind Singh, a patriotic symbol as well as religious, is celebrated by Sikhs all around the world.
The petition states the lack of a national policy on the matter despite Sikhism being the 5th largest religion in the world and one of the major religions in India.
The plea speaks of the lack of an act that dictates provisions on Public Holidays excluding the one on Weekly Holidays Act 1942, resulting in Public Holidays being used at the behest of political groups.
It speaks of the lack of having an act of such nature when leading powers like New Zealand, United Kingdoms, and the USA have their holidays governed by legislation.
This comes with a writ petition filed through Advocate Durga Dutt as an attempt to create a national holiday for Guru Gobind Singh.
Therefore, the bench took cognisance of the matter on the request made by Senior Adv. Vikas Singh to have the matter looked into the by next week so that his birthday might become a National Holiday in 2021.
