Delay in bypolls for 4 assembly seats in Punjab breather for AAP
Ruchika M Khanna
Chandigarh, August 16
The delay in bypolls for the four assembly constituencies in Punjab has come as a breather for the Aam Aadmi Party as it makes a dash for contesting the assembly polls in neighbouring Haryana.
The elections for the four assembly segments of Dera Baba Nanak, Chabbewal, Barnala and Gidderbaha were expected to be announced on Friday, along with the assembly elections in Haryana and Jammu and Kashmir. However, the Chief Election Commissioner said that the 47 byelections across the country (including one on Lok Sabha seat of Wayanad) would be announced at a later date.
This delay will also allow the ruling party to start some of the development projects in the state, before the polls are announced. For example, the government has already initiated the work of the construction of Malwa canal, in a bid to woo Gidderbaha voters.
Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann has been repeatedly saying that he would want to introduce some public welfare schemes before another code of conduct for the four assembly bypolls is announced. Also, being the most bankable mass party leader, since party supremo Arvind Kejriwal’s incarceration, Mann will be able to give his complete attention to the Haryana polls, along with party’s chief poll strategist and national general secretary (organisation) Sandeep Pathak, Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh and Sunita Kejriwal.
This delay, however, has not desisted the lobbying for tickets among party leaders, even as the party top leadership has made it clear that they would prefer fielding party loyalists, over party hoppers. It is learnt that intense lobbying has begun in the ruling party on at least two seats of Dera Baba Nanak and Chabbewal, for securing a ticket.
Sources say that the two MPs from Sangrur and Hoshiarpur — Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer and Dr Raj Kumar Chabbewal — will also have a say in the selection of candidates for the Barnala and Chabbewal seats, especially because they were the incumbent MLAs from these two seats and continue to hold a sway there.
It may be mentioned that four seats had fallen vacant in Kune this year after MLAs elected in 2022, contested and won the Lok Sabha polls. The bypolls have to be held within six months of the seats falling vacant, which means that these have to be held before mid-December. While Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa of the Congress won as MP from Gurdaspur, Dr Raj Kumar Chabbewal, earlier with the Congress, jumped to AAP, and won from Hoshiarpur Lok Sabha seat. The Sangrur election was won by former sports minister Gurmeer Singh Meet Hayer, while State Congress president Amarinder Singh Raja Warring won from Ludhiana Lok Sabha seat, thus leading to his subsequent resignation as Gidderbaha MLA.
Though another SAD MLA, Dr Sukhwinder Singh Sukhi (representing Banga) joined AAP two days back, he has not resigned from the Vidhan Sabha so far. It is unclear if he will resign anytime soon, necessitating a fifth assembly bypoll for Banga along with the other four.
