Bathinda, Ludhiana constituencies ‘expenditure sensitive’, declares EC

Tribune News Service

Sukhmeet Bhasin

Bathinda, May 6

Two Lok Sabha constituencies — Bathinda and Ludhiana — have been declared as “expenditure sensitive” in Punjab for the forthcoming General Elections.

In Bathinda, five Assembly segments — Mansa, Bathinda Rural, Lambi, Talwandi and Maur have been listed as expenditure sensitive. In Ludhiana, six assembly segments — Gill, Jagraon, Dakha, Ludhiana East, Ludhiana South and Ludhiana West.

Both are politically hot seats as Bathinda is a home turf of Badal family where three time MP and former Union Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal is facing tough challenge this time from state Agriculture Minister and AAP candidate Gurmeet Singh Khuddian, former MLA and Congress candidate Jeetmohinder Singh Sidhu , former SAD minister Sikander Singh Maluka’s daughter-in-law Parampal Kaur Sidhu, who is contesting on BJP ticket.

As per election authorities, the ‘expenditure sensitive’ constituencies are suspected areas with a high possibility of political parties and candidates attempting to influence voters with freebies — in cash and kind, liquor, coupons and so on.

While Ludhiana is also political relevant as after sitting Congress MP Ravneet Bittu joined BJP and is candidate of BJP this time, Congress has fielded PPCC president Amarinder Singh Raja Warring from Ludhiana Lok Sabha seat, which has made it an interesting poll battle.

Bathinda Deputy Commissioner Jaspreet Singh said, “As Bathinda along with Ludhiana has been flagged as expenditure sensitive in Punjab, static surveillance teams and expenditure observers would reach here by tomorrow when nominations starts getting filed and they would keep a tab on the expenditure of the contesting candidates”.

Their task will be to monitor whether the expenses made by the political parties for the polls are as per the norms set by the Election Commission.

The DC also said that CCTV surveillance is being done on inter-state borders and roads and teams are on their toes to plug the follow of the unaccounted cash and liquor. He also appealed to the people to file any complaint regarding violation of code of conduct on c-VIGIL Citizen mobile application claiming that within 100 minutes, the complaint shall be resolved and strict action will be taken if anyone found guilty.

High chances of use of liquor, money

As per election authorities, the ‘expenditure sensitive’ constituencies are suspected areas with a high possibility of political parties and candidates attempting to influence voters with freebies — in cash and kind, liquor, coupons and so on. Both are politically hot seats as Bathinda is the home turf of Badals where three time MP and former Union Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal is facing tough challenge from state Agriculture Minister and AAP candidate Gurmeet Singh Khuddian, Congress candidate Jeetmohinder Singh Sidhu , former SAD minister Sikander Singh Maluka’s daughter-in-law Parampal Kaur Sidhu, who is contesting on BJP ticket.

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