GenNext on 6 seats of Doaba

Tribune News Service

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Jalandhar, January 22

Six seats of Doaba will see new generation of political leaders in the fray for the forthcoming state Assembly elections.

While Bawa Henry (37) has replaced his father and former minister Avtar Henry from the Jalandhar (North) seat as the Congress candidate, Angad Singh (26) is the new nominee in place of his mother and sitting Congress MLA of Nawanshahr, Guriqbal Kaur. Likewise, Vikramjit Chaudhary (39) will be contesting instead of his now MP father Chaudhary Santokh Singh as Congress nominee from Phillaur, his cousin Ch Surinder Singh has replaced his father and ex-Congress minister Ch Jagjit Singh, who passed away last year, at Kartarpur.

While there have been four parent-son replacements in the Congress, there has been one such case in the BJP too. Mahinder Bhagat has replaced his octogenarian father and BJP minister Bhagat Chunni Lal as the Jalandhar (West) candidate. At Bholath, sitting Akali MLA Jagir Kaur’s son-in-law Yuvraj Bhupinder Singh (41) is the new nominee.

As a commonality, the replacement has come out of a compulsion on each seat. Avtar Henry lost his voting right, becoming ineligible to contest. The seat moved to two other party leaders -Tajinder Bittu and before landing up again in the same family, making Henry emerge all the more powerful this time. Jagir Kaur could not get a stay on her conviction, making her ineligible to contest. Even after Yuvraj’s nomination, she kept seeking relief from the Supreme Court but in vain.

Angad’s father and ex-MLA Parkash Singh is no more, while his mother is suffering from joint problem. He had a stiff contest from Nawanshahr district president Satvir Singh Palli Jhikki before being nominated.

In Phillaur, Vikramjit faced a contest from his mother Karamjit Kaur Chaudhary, former DPI, who got nominated instead of him initially before the ticket returning to him. He was a little insecure even on the entry of former Akali minister Sarwan Singh Phillaur from the seat.

Mahinder Bhagat too was unsure of his claim earlier as BJP state president Vijay Sampla was in favour of his own aide Sheetal Angural. The elder Bhagat remained quite inactive in his tenure because of the age factor.

The trend of seats being passed onto sons in the family is somehow not as much acceptable. It now remains to be seen as to how many of the six next generation candidates are able to perform better to maintain their parent’s citadels.