Another turncoat whistle-blower wins high-profile Payal segment

Tribune News Service

Nitin Jain

Ludhiana, March 24

Another turncoat and whistle-blower Manwinder Singh Giaspura of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has demolished the Congress citadel to win the high-profile Payal Assembly seat, which had been represented by former Chief Minister Beant Singh and former Vidhan Sabha speaker and former Lok Sabha deputy speaker Dr Charanjit Singh Atwal.

The AAP first-timer, Giaspura (47), defeated sitting Congress MLA Lakhvir Singh (47) by a margin of 33,009 votes. He polled 63,633 votes, which accounted for 50.18 per cent of the total polled votes while Lakhvir got 30,624 votes, constituting 24.15 per cent vote share.

Except the Congress, which ended a runner-up, all other 16 candidates in the poll fray, including Dr Jaspreet Singh Bija of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Bhagwan Singh Somal Kheri of the Communist Party of India (CPI), Harshit Kumar Sheetal of the Shiromani Akali Dal (Sanyukt), Gurpreet Singh of the Bahujan Mukti Party (BMP), Jagdeep Singh of the Lok Insaaf Party (LIP), Ranjit Singh Kaka of the Punjab Kisan Dal (PKD), Rajdeep Kaur of the Jai Jawan Jai Kisan Party (JJJKP), Rampal Singh Daultpur of the SAD (Amritsar), Lakhvir Singh Lakha of the Peoples Party of India (Democratic), Simardeep Singh Doburji of the Sanyukt Samaj Morcha (SSM), and Independents Harchand Singh, Gurdeep Singh Kali, Jagtar Singh Lamba, Prabhjot Singh and Malkit Singh, who all polled less than 16.67 per cent votes, required to secure the security deposit.

Know your MLA

Manwinder Singh Giaspura (47), had joined AAP after quitting the LIP in March last year. He had unsuccessfully contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections as the LIP candidate from the Fatehgarh Sahib constituency and had lost his security deposit by polling just 14.43 per cent vote share. A postgraduate from Punjabi University, Patiala, in 2003, Giaspura was a whistle-blower of the shocking massacre of 32 Sikhs at Hond Chillar village in Rewari district of Haryana during the 1984 anti-Sikh riots.

He was working with a MNC when he raised his voice against the massacre and took the legal recourse to seek justice for the aggrieved families. Though he lost his job in the legal battle and faced lots of pulls and pressures, the aggrieved families got justice in the shape of compensation in 2018.

After losing his job, Giaspura ventured into a cloth manufacturing business to earn his livelihood.

“Education, health, and employment generation will be my priorities and will work hard to realise the dreams of the public, which reposed faith in us,” the new MLA said, while sharing that he was inspired by the performance of AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal and the Delhi model of governance, which will be replicated in Punjab.

He said the new AAP government in Punjab would wipe out the widespread corruption and free society of all ills that prevailed during successive regimes of the traditional parties in the state.

Past trend

Payal had remained a high-profile Assembly constituency as it had been represented by the former Chief Minister and former Vidhan Sabha Speaker and former Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker in the past. Congress heavyweight and slain Chief Minister Beant Singh had represented the rural seat four times consecutively and his son Tej Parkash Singh, who had served as transport minister, twice consecutively, while the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) veteran leader and former Assembly Speaker and former Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker DR Charanjit Singh Atwal had also been elected from the segment in 2012.

While the Congress had represented the seat for a maximum of 10 times in 2017, 2007, 2002, 1992, 1980, 1977, 1972, 1969, 1967 and 1962, SAD candidates had won from here thrice in 2012, 1997 and 1985.

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