Former Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu.
| Photo Credit: ANI
As the Lok Sabha election attracts nearer, the Congress unit in Punjab seems to be struggling to set its home in order, discovering itself in a scenario much like what the celebration noticed earlier than the 2022 State election.
Former Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu is in the attention of the storm.
He has been addressing a number of impartial rallies in the State following his early launch from jail after being imprisoned in a street rage case.
‘Prospects at risk’
His actions have evoked sharp criticism from senior Punjab Congress leaders, who’re of the opinion that his actions could threat the celebration’s electoral prospects.
In explicit, Mr. Sidhu is stoking celebration tensions by publicly supporting an electoral alliance with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the State in opposition to the backdrop of the INDIA bloc, thus going in opposition to the views of a number of senior leaders who’ve been vital of the identical.
Mr. Sidhu’s rallies have additionally seen help from numerous leaders who had been earlier expelled by the Congress for “anti-party activities”.
Although Punjab unit president Amarinder Raja Warring stated he had no objection to Congressmen holding rallies, Leader of the Opposition in the Punjab Assembly Partap Singh Bajwa urged Mr. Sidhu, following a rally in Bathinda on December 17, to “join the party’s programmes instead of setting up his own platform”.
Subsequently, Mr. Sidhu posted a response of a gaggle of his loyalists, together with former MLAs, stating that numerous workplace bearers, together with Mr. Sidhu, “are not invited to most Punjab Congress events”.
Demands for ouster
As the factionalism throughout the celebration got here to the fore, numerous leaders, together with incumbent MLAs, even demanded final month that Mr. Sidhu be ousted from the Congress.
In a joint assertion titled “Bomb in the Basement: Sidhu Waiting To Implode”, they added that the previous State unit president’s actions “often work against the interests of the party as a whole”.
Meanwhile, in a rally held in Hoshiarpur district on Tuesday, Mr. Sidhu made a veiled assault on his opponents, saying he merely seeks to talk up in the curiosity of the State.
“Five to seven thousand people gather to see me. I don’t know why that gives some people a stomach ache,” he stated.
Damage management
In a bid to ease simmering tensions, the celebration’s newly appointed Punjab affairs in-charge, Devender Yadav, on Tuesday met senior State Congress leaders, together with Mr. Warring, Mr. Bajwa, and Mr. Sidhu, in Chandigarh.
Emphasising that he sought to grasp the State unit’s positioning ahead of the elections, Mr. Yadav stated: “I am committed to engaging with every leader, worker, and official to address concerns and gain a nuanced understanding of the party’s functioning.”
