Punjab MPs told Congress president Sonia Gandhi that public comments by former state unit chiefs Navjot Singh Sidhu and Sunil Jakhar “hurt” the party during the assembly elections. Gandhi held a meeting with the Punjab MPs on Wednesday to take stock of the party’s humiliating loss to the Aam Aadmi Party in the state.
A day before on Tuesday, Gandhi had asked the unit chiefs of five states to hand in their resignations over the poll debacle. Following this, Punjab Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu, too, resigned from his post earlier in the day.
In his one-line resignation, Sidhu wrote, “I hereby resign as President (PPCC).”
At the meeting held to discuss the party’s rout in Punjab, most MPs said public comments by Sidhu and Jakhar hurt the party. Some of the MPs also accused state incharges Ajay Maken and Harish Chaudhary of selling tickets. Senior leader and former chief minister Harish Rawat is also facing similar allegations in Uttarakhand.
Anandpur Sahib MP Manish Tewari said the situation became worse after the formation of the Mallikarjun Kharge-led panel, which ultimately led to the dismissal of Captain Amarinder Singh from the post of CM. Tewari has been vocal about the infighting in the Punjab Congress, as well as the showdown between Sidhu and Captain ahead of the assembly polls.
In the days leading up to the elections, Sidhu also staked claim to become the CM candidate of the party in Punjab, soon after Charanjit Singh Channi replaced Amarinder Singh. Many state Congress leaders are saying his commentary against Channi even after he became CM also hurt the party’s prospects, showing there were cracks within the party’s structure.
Sidhu faced defeat from his stronghold Amritsar (East). He was locked in a high-profile contest with Shiromani Akali Dal leader Bikram Singh Majithia but faced defeat at the hands of AAP candidate Jeevanjyot Kaur, who defeated him by a margin of 6,750 votes.
Sidhu is a three-time Amritsar MP from the BJP. In 2014 he “sacrificed” this seat for his ‘guru’ Arun Jaitley. Later, he was adjusted in the Rajya Sabha by the BJP but not finding a bigger role in Punjab, he quit the party and resigned from Parliament.
Jakhar, too, distanced himself from the party’s affairs in the state after Channi took over as CM. After supposedly being snubbed as a potential candidate to replace Amarinder, he has been accused of promoting the “anti-Hindu” narrative that many leaders are saying could have hurt the party’s performance in the state. On March 14, Jakhar had hit out at Channi and called him a liability whose “greed pulled the party down”.
On his scathing attack after the party’s defeat in the state, the veteran leader told News18 that had he raised his voice when Channi was chosen as CM, there would have been no difference between him and Sidhu.
“Why is everyone gunning for Sidhu? It’s because he raised all these issues, which would have been raised within the four walls of the party. But I think he played the opposition. I had my reservations, yes. Even when Rahul (Gandhi) ji told me to come and join the government as deputy CM, I refused. I told him that I do not even accept this fellow Channi as my leader and you are asking me to work under him,” Jakhar said in an exclusive interview.
Jakhar had also targeted senior party leader Ambika Soni for trying to project Channi as an asset. On Sunday, former minister and senior leader Balbir Singh Sidhu, who lost from Mohali, had also said the Congress leadership scripted its own defeat by giving power to turncoats and opportunists alien to the Congress, its history and its culture.
(With inputs from PTI and IANS)
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