Barred from entering villages, BJP Ludhiana candidate Ravneet Bittu keeps to cities

Nitin Jain

Ludhiana, May 17

BJP’s Ludhiana candidate Ravneet Singh Bittu, who has been facing protests by farmers in villages, has devised a strategy to hold rallies only in urban areas and reach out to residents of villages only on the phone.

Bittu aims to counter the charge of party-hopping as he aims to pip his rival, Amrinder Singh Raja Warring, Punjab Congress president.

Was first to oppose farm laws

Punjabis, especially farmers, know well that I was the first MP who had openly opposed the controversial farm laws and had slept on the roadside in Delhi till the time they were withdrawn. Ravneet Bittu, BJP nominee from Ludhiana

The cornerstone of his strategy rests on the pillar of making the urban areas his butt of concentration and avoiding villages where the farmers are up against the saffron party.

Instead of holding public meetings and rallies in the villages, the three-time MP is connecting with the villagers, farmers, supporters and party activists over the phone.

The BJP’s old ally SAD had not only supported the now-scrapped farm laws but had also misguided the BJP-led Union government on the issue, he added.

The 48-year-old firebrand parliamentarian, who had recently left the Congress to join the BJP, had contested and won his maiden election from the Anandpur Sahib Lok Sabha constituency in 2009. He had won the last two Lok Sabha elections in 2014 and 2019 from Ludhiana.

It was after the May 8 black flag protest by a handful of farmers in Mukandpur village that the BJP candidate decided to focus his campaign in cities and abstained from visiting the rural areas to avert a direct faceoff with the protesters. “We’re close to Bittu since the old days when his grandfather Beant Singh was the CM but now our unions have called for opposing the BJP candidates following which we cannot support him openly,” shared Amrik Singh of Kishanpur.