The resignation of cricketer turned politician Navjot Singh Sidhu from Rajya Sabha has sent Punjab politics into a tailspin, and if speculations about his joining AAP turn out to be true then it would
The resignation of cricketer turned politician Navjot Singh Sidhu from Rajya Sabha has sent Punjab politics into a tailspin, and if speculations about his joining AAP turn out to be true then it would surely be a shot in the arm for the AAP, before the crucial Punjab assembly elections due in the next six months.
The other theory that is being put forward after Sidhu’s resignation is that the BJP and Akalis could part ways in Punjab and contest elections independently.
Navjot Singh Sidhu was the most popular face of the Punjab BJP who represented Amritsar parliamentary constituency from 2004-2014. He was unceremoniously removed as party candidate by finance minister Arun Jaitley in the 2016 parliamentary seat, which started his differences with the BJP leadership. Mr Sidhu never campaigned for Mr Jaitley in the Amritsar parliamentary elections.
There was speculation since a long time in Punjab’s political circles that Mr Sidhu would join the AAP. The BJP meanwhile tried to soothe Mr Sidhu by offering him the position of chairman of the National Minorities Commission, which he declined. However, these speculations were curtailed after the BJP tried to placate Mr Sidhu by nominating him to the Rajya Sabha.
However, now with Mr Sidhu resigning from the Rajya Sabha, the speculation that he will join the AAP again gained momentum.
Political observers in Punjab feel that if Mr Sidhu joined the AAP, it would be a big time gain for the AAP in Punjab, which is already on an upswing in view of the anti-incumbency against the Akali-BJP combine government.
The acrimony between Mr Sidhu and the Akali-BJP combine government however, never ended, as was evident from the outburst of Mr Sidhu’s wife, who is a minister in the Punjab government.
Navjot Kaur Sidhu’s recent outburst against the government was that “drugs are distributed in the red beacon vehicles and the red beacons are freely distributed by the state government to every other person”. She has also said in the past that the BJP should part ways with the Akalis in Punjab and stand on its own. There are now very strong rumours that Navjot Kaur Sidhu could also resign from the Akali-BJP government as minister. The AAP could find a genuine crowd puller in Sidhu, a known political face and Jat-Sikh leader who has acceptability all across Punjab. So far, the AAP has lagged in credible, known political faces: except for a couple of leaders, like Sucha Singh Chotepur, who is a veteran politician of Punjab, most of the AAP leaders in Punjab are political greenhorns. Navjot Singh Sidhu, being a fiery orator, who can connect with the masses, could be the voice of AAP in Punjab.
