I’m not making this up! There’s actually a political party for the Punjabi community. And it has been in existence for last 24 years! Imagine my surprise.

Anyway, according to the newly elected president, the party has about 3000 members which is hardly 5% of the community. Like that means cannot claim you represent the community lah… I guess the party have to engage in aggressive membership drive before being able to even think about joining BN.

As for MIC blocking their application to join BN, well, I doubt a party with just 3,000 members can have enough clout to be a partner in coalition. I don’t think even PR will consider taking them as coalition member, yet.

Dr Susheel Kaur, 59, yesterday, became the first woman president of the 24-year-old Parti Punjabi Malaysia (PPM).
The senior consultant, who majored in social impact studies, was elected unopposed by more than 50 delegates at the party’s biennial general meeting here.

Speaking to the New Straits Times, Susheel admitted that she was not cut out to be a politician but stressed that she felt responsible for the party which was founded in 1986 by her father, Jeswant Singh.
She took over the reins from her cousin, Datuk Dr Gurdeep Perkash Singh, who had helmed the party for the last six years. She had served as the party’s secretary for 10 years.
With a Ph.D in population geography from Punjab University, Chandigarh, India, she believed that her academic qualification and working experience would assist her in formulating a new direction for the party.
She, however, acknowledged sentiments within the Punjabi community which saw the party as a weakling compared with other political groups.

“One of the reasons why the party has not been able to leap forward and become the de-facto voice of the Punjabis in this country is because of its repeated failures to gain admission into Barisan Nasional.

“We have been trying to do this for over 10 years now. Not fewer than six applications were submitted but all went unanswered. In fact, our latest application was made on Feb 2. We are still waiting for an answer.”

She added that it was an open secret that an Indian-based party within the BN coalition had opposed PPM joining the ruling coalition.

Asked if PPM, under her presidency, would continue to lobby to get into BN, Susheel said many in the party were feeling that they were already at the edge of their patience, with some believing that BN would never admit the party into its fold.

“The admissibility issue is a thorny one. If things do not move in a positive direction, PPM would have to consider other options,” she said, alluding to the possibility of the party joining Parti Keadilan Rakyat.

She said the party also needed to work harder to get more Punjabis to be members, stressing that the party hardly represented five per cent of the 130,000-strong community in the country.

With about 3,000 members now, Susheel said it would be difficult for the party to engineer socio-economic policies for the community unless it went all out to form partnerships or networking with the various Sikh and Punjabi non-governmental organisations in the country.

The single, soft-spoken president believes that PPM could not afford to be seen or treated as a weak political organisation.

“I feel great to have been elected as PPM’s first woman president and I promise I’ll give my best to raise the profile of the only Punjabi political party in this country,” she said.

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