Capt Amarinder, Dhindsa meet Amit Shah, Nadda in Delhi; 6-member panel to finalise seat-sharing pact in Punjab

Vibha Sharma

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, December 27

A joint six-member panel—two from each constituent party—will finalise the seat-sharing pact between the BJP, Capt Amarinder Singh’s Punjab Lok Congress and former Akali Dal leader Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa’s SAD (Sanyukt) in the upcoming Punjab Assembly polls. The three parties will also issue a joint manifesto, BJP’s poll in-charge for Punjab, Union Minister Gajendra Shekhawat, said on Monday.

The six-member panel will prepare a joint manifesto to create “a new Punjab”, he said.

Capt Amarinder and Dhindsa today met the BJP’s top leadership, including Home Minister Amit Shah and party president J P Nadda, here to chalk out a strategy for the upcoming Assembly polls.

“It was decided in the meeting that the BJP and the other two parties would jointly contest the upcoming Assembly polls in Punjab,” Shekhawat said.

Meanwhile, BJP leaders said elections in Punjab would be multi-cornered with the Congress, the SAD, the AAP and various farmers outfit joining the fray—a situation that may help the alliance

The new alliance will help BJP align with prominent Sikh faces in the state, they said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to launch the alliance’s campaign in the state with a rally in earlyJanuary. Sources say the election scene will pick up further with PM Modi and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi planning rallies. However, it all depends upon CEC directions/restrictions.

Keeping in mind the Chandigarh MC poll verdict, the BJP is looking towards contesting urban seats. Sources claimed that the BJP would get a major share.

The PM is expected to make “big announcements” at his rally in the state where his party is trying to emerge from the shadows of estranged former ally Akali Dal. The rally will mark the point that the BJP is no longer the second fiddle to any party.

There will be big announcements for the state, BJP leaders said

“The Prime Minister has already given the biggest gift to farmers by rolling back the three farm laws,” they say, adding that the new alliance with Amarinder Singh-led Punjab Lok Congress will give the border state a “new lease of life, a new direction it deserves”.

“The next government in Punjab will include the BJP,” party leaders here claim. With the Akalis, who parted ways in the wake of the now-repealed farm laws, the BJP remained limited to 23 seats with the senior leadership openly acknowledging them as the big brother in the NDA alliance in Punjab. “The BJP is aiming for a bigger role in the state. Not only urban voters, farmers and rural Punjab will also support us,” several leaders claim.

Security and communal harmony in the border state are expected to be among the top leads of the BJP’s narrative for the upcoming elections.

Meanwhile, the BJP is scouting for and gathering “winnable candidates” to contest in the state. Recently, former SAD leader and president of the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee Manjinder Singh Sirsa and former minister Rana Gurmit Singh Sodhi, a loyalist of Captain Amarinder, joined the saffron party after quitting the Congress, accusing it of putting the state’s “security and communal harmony at stake”.