RAIN OR not, every cloud in Delhi these days has a Sirsa lining.
As the breathless Capital runs its ritual last-minute race against pollution, debutant Environment Minister Manjinder Singh Sirsa has been here, there, everywhere – on the ground and up in the air. According to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which has been snapping at the Delhi government’s heels, the fog over the BJP leader’s plan of action, meanwhile, thickens.
With curbing pollution one of the key promises of the BJP government, which came to power earlier this year, Sirsa holds one of the most high-profile jobs in the Delhi Cabinet. However, while the task is tall, the 52-year-old hasn’t helped his cause.
One of his first moves that came under question concerned the fuel ban on end-of-life vehicles in July. Within days of the ban coming into place, the Delhi government asked the Commission for Air Quality Management to put on hold the order, which said petrol pumps would not supply fuel to diesel vehicles that are 10 years or older, and petrol ones that are 15 years or older.
Faced with a public pushback, Sirsa took a position different from Chief Minister Rekha Gupta’s on the government’s about-turn on the policy. While Sirsa said the system being used to identify old vehicles was not fully functional, Gupta said the decision was being reversed as it affected the lives and livelihoods of “lakhs of families”.
Then came the Diwali firecracker ban, which the right wing had made a question of “Hindu sentiments” when the AAP government was in power.
The BJP government approached the Supreme Court ahead of the festival, urging it to not ban firecrackers entirely and allow people to use “green firecrackers”. Eventually, after several hearings, the Court granted its plea, with a direction to the district administration and police to ensure that fireworks were restricted to two time slots – 6 am to 7 am, and 8 pm to 10 pm, both on Chhoti Diwali (October 19) and Diwali (October 20).
The direction was widely flouted, with violations reported from across NCR.
An analysis of particulate matter (PM) 2.5 trends by research and advisory group Climate Trends, released post-Diwali, showed that pollution levels this year after the festival were the highest in five years. Sirsa’s ministry also came under fire for data from AQI “missing” for multiple hours between 11 pm and 5 am post-Diwali night.
Sirsa’s response was to put the blame on the AAP, saying its government in Punjab had “forced farmers” there to burn stubble to make Delhi’s air bad. He also accused the AAP of “speaking the language of those who admire Aurangzeb and Akbar”, and “abusing” a sacred Hindu tradition.
This argument fizzled, as data showed that farm fires in Punjab at the time were at the lowest for this part of the year.
In the period since Diwali, as haze has enveloped the Capital, the Opposition has accused the Delhi Environment Ministry of furthering a “massive pollution data fraud”, with spraying of water almost non-stop around the Anand Vihar ISBT pollution monitoring station “to artificially lower AQI (air quality index) readings”.
Sirsa landed himself in more hot water this week when he personally led a high-profile experiment to induce rain in the Capital through cloud-seeding. Experts warned it would do little to fight pollution, and was a long shot. Rain finally eluded Delhi and Sirsa, who was sharing constant updates on the experiment on social media, on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the government abandoned another trial.
And yet, this was supposed to be Sirsa’s finest hour. A former Shiromani Akali Dal leader who had been a bitter critic of the BJP during the 2020 farm law agitation, held for a year at Delhi’s borders, Sirsa moved to the BJP just a year later.
With its long-lasting alliance with the Akali Dal coming apart in the wake of the farm law protests, the BJP was looking for a credible Sikh face before the 2022 Assembly elections in Punjab, and Sirsa was seen as fitting the bill.
A former officer on special duty to Akali Dal leader Sukhbir Singh Badal, when he was Punjab Deputy CM, Sirsa served as the president of the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) in 2013 and 2017. The DSGMC was one of the leading voices in the agitation against the farm laws.
In 2021, after he lost an election to become a member of the DSGMC, the Shiromani Gurudwara Parbandhak Committee nominated him. Sirsa was slated to head the DSGMC again, till his nomination was challenged on the basis that he did not know Gurmukhi well. He gave a test as part of which he wrote a letter with 46 Gurmukhi words he selected, 27 of which were found to have errors. Sirsa subsequently joined the BJP.
In Delhi politics, Sirsa has been around since 2013, when he won as an Akali Dal candidate, with BJP support, from Rajouri Garden in Delhi. In the 2015 AAP sweep, however, he lost from the seat to Jarnail Singh. In 2017, after Jarnail Singh resigned from the seat as was fielded by the AAP in the Punjab Assembly elections, Sirsa won it in a bypoll. This time, he contested from Rajouri Garden on the BJP symbol, as part of an alliance agreement between the BJP and Akali Dal.
In August 2023, the BJP made Sirsa one of its national general secretaries. In the 2025 Assembly elections, which brought the BJP to power after a gap of 27 years in the Capital, the party fielded him from Rajouri Garden again and he won.
In his affidavit, Sirsa declared assets close to Rs 260 crore with his spouse, making him the second richest MLA in the Vidhan Sabha.
His elevation as a Cabinet minister followed, in another nod by the BJP to voters in Punjab as well as the wealthy and influential constituency of Sikhs in Delhi.
Sirsa holds not just Environment but also other prestigious ministries such as Industries and Food & Supplies. Those two portfolios have been more uneventful, with Sirsa at the forefront in Delhi’s efforts to attract emerging technology companies, with draft proposals for an Industrial and Startup Policy released in the public domain for feedback.