Nearly two decades ago, Harsimrat Kaur Badal stood at the Golden Temple distributing saplings under Nanhi Chhaan, a campaign that sought to connect two concerns confronting Punjab – protection of the girl child and the environment. The message was simple but striking.
Badal became one of its most visible public faces. Eighteen years later, the sapling has given way to a political memorandum.
Launched at the Golden Temple in August 2008, Nanhi Chhaan distributed saplings as “buta parshad” and promoted awareness around female foeticide and environmental protection.
The controversy became one of the most politically sensitive issues confronting the Akali Dal and continued to shadow the party long after it lost power. On Tuesday, the campaign moved to Mansa and Sardulgarh. On Wednesday, Harsimrat visited Lambi and Gidderbaha. Punjab’s future lies in the hands of its women,” she said at a public gathering in Lambi on Wednesday. Today, when these very women feel cheated, I will stand shoulder to shoulder with them and raise my voice for their dignity, justice and rights,” she added. Today, women walking with her are carrying memorandums.
Drugs, alleged police excesses, women’s dignity and financial support are among the issues she has sought to foreground. Badal herself is now framing the campaign in broader political terms. “Women are not merely Punjab’s strength. The choice of language is telling. The shift is politically significant. Women whom Harsimrat once addressed through social empowerment are now at the centre of a political mobilisation. Politics, however, did not wait for Harsimrat to choose the moment for a larger role. That electoral durability is part of her political identity, but so is the family name. She is married to Sukhbir Singh Badal. Her father-in-law, Parkash Singh Badal, was among Punjab’s longest-serving chief ministers. Her brother, Bikram Singh Majithia, is another prominent Akali politician. The background gives Harsimrat familiarity with organisation and power, but it also makes any political reinvention difficult to separate from the Badal legacy. That is perhaps the central tension in her current journey. SAD’s broader challenge in recent years has not simply been about personalities. It has been about rebuilding trust after a dramatic erosion of its traditional electoral base. Her resignation was formally accepted by the President the following day. Giving up a Cabinet position was significant. But the decision also came after anger against the legislation had intensified among Punjab’s farmers, leaving SAD to answer questions about whether it had read the political mood too late. Harsimrat’s parliamentary interventions have frequently focused on Punjab-specific subjects — farmers, river waters, Chandigarh, Sikh issues and federal questions. The figures show more debates than the national average, while her attendance and number of questions are below the corresponding national averages. One recurring theme in Harsimrat’s recent speeches has been beadbi (sacrilege). She has attacked successive governments over sacrilege cases and spoken about accountability. But the issue also forces SAD to confront its own most difficult period. There is another unresolved issue around SAD’s future: its relationship with the BJP. Yet speculation about a possible SAD-BJP rapprochement has persisted. At the same time, public discussion around the former alliance continues. For SAD, any future rapprochement would inevitably raise the question of what has changed since the farm-law rupture that ended their decades-old partnership. This is where Harsimrat’s latest women-centred campaign becomes more than another party programme. Nanhi Chhaan associated her public image with daughters, women and the environment. Now, the Maawan-Dhiyan campaign brings the language of mothers and daughters directly onto the political street. But a women-centred campaign also invites scrutiny of SAD’s own record — on drugs, policing, social welfare and women’s political representation. It cannot work only as criticism of the government in power. It is whether she can build a political identity that is recognisably her own while still carrying one of Punjab politics’ most recognisable surnames. Eighteen years ago, she distributed saplings in the name of Punjab’s daughters.
The resignation, therefore, remains both an important marker in Harsimrat’s individual career and part of a more complicated chapter in SAD’s relationship with Punjab’s farmers. Harsimrat’s larger test, therefore, is not simply whether she can support Sukhbir at rallies or mobilise women for protest marches. “For 20 years, I have been blessed with their love, trust and support. As Punjab moves towards the 2027 Assembly election, the question is whether that association with women-centric causes can develop into a broader political connection with women voters. Harsimrat first entered Parliament from Bathinda in 2009 and is now a four-term Lok Sabha MP. Her 2024 victory came when the Shiromani Akali Dal had been reduced to a much smaller political force across Punjab, yet she retained Bathinda. Harsimrat Badal served as Union Minister for Food Processing Industries from May 2014 until September 2020. The more consequential political moment came on September 17, 2020, when she resigned from the Union Cabinet in protest against the Centre’s farm legislation. PRS Legislative Research data for the current Lok Sabha, up to August 13, 2026, records 29 debates and 90 questions, with attendance at 69 per cent. The 2015 Bargari sacrilege incidents and subsequent police firing on Sikh protesters took place when the SAD-BJP government was in power. The BJP’s official position, reiterated by Punjab in-charge Satish Poonia, is that it intends to contest all 117 Assembly seats independently in 2027. Whether that journey from social symbolism to political mobilisation creates a larger role for Harsimrat Kaur Badal or helps the Akali Dal recover lost political ground before 2027 remains an open question.
On September 21, Harsimrat Badal launched a women-focused “Maawan-Dhiyan” campaign at Rampura Phul and Nathana in Bathinda, addressing gatherings, leading protest marches and submitting memorandums addressed to the Punjab Governor. Announcing her decision, she said she was proud to stand with farmers as their “daughter and sister”. Harsimrat’s recent language has at times returned to the traditional Akali argument of Punjab’s interests versus “Delhi-controlled” politics. Her 2020 resignation allowed her to position herself alongside farmers as a “daughter and sister”.
Harsimrat was with him. The attack disrupted a political campaign in which Sukhbir had been expected to remain the principal face. What followed was not the making of a new politician. She has been in electoral politics for nearly two decades. What changed was the role she was suddenly required to play – and the visibility with which she began playing it. Her first major address after the attack, at Isru, was personal. She spoke about her husband’s injuries, her family and what she described as attempts to weaken the Akali Dal. In subsequent rallies, her speeches moved towards broader political questions — drugs, sacrilege, rival parties, Punjab’s relationship with Delhi and SAD’s future.
On August 13, her husband and Shiromani Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal was attacked with a kirpan during a visit to a gurdwara in Nanded.
