Internecine war has started among the warring factions of the Punjab Congress Legislative Party and new alignments are taking place in the party before the election of Punjab Vidhan Sabha in 2022.
Will Congress come out victorious under such a situation. This is the main question being posed by the well wishers of the party. They are rather disappointed with the emerging situation and finding themselves helpless.
One group of the legislature is led by the Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh who has majority of the ministers and legislators with him and another group consisting of dissident Congressmen who are also gaining strength day by day.
The fight between the two factions at present is at its peak and needs immediate intervention of the Congress High Command. Will the weak Congress high command succeed in closing the ranks of the warring factions? Doubts are being expressed in this regard.
Harish Rawat, General Secretary of the All India Congress Committee and incharge of Punjab affairs has appealed to both the factions to stop fighting and he would seek the intervention of the party high command. Harish Rawat is a weak leader and the advisers of the Punjab Chief Minister are very aggressive and very loyal to him and they would not allow the situation to calm down.
The situation in the Punjab Legislature party has worsened during the past one week although, the skirmishes were going on between Navjot Singh Sidhu former Local Bodies Minister and the Chief Minister despite efforts by Harish Rawat.
The situation took an ugly turn when Punjab Vigilance Bureau started inquiries into certain alleged irregularities committed by the aides of Navjot Sidhu and his wife. Some of the supporters of Navjot Singh Sidhu namely Pargat Singh, MLA and some other leaders took exception to the vigilance enquiries and extended their support to Sidhu.
The initiation of vigilance inquiries was also not liked by the senior Congress leaders namely Partap Singh Bajwa, member Rajya Sabha, Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa and Charanjit Singh Channi and they extended their support to Sidhu and criticized the vigilance enquiries against the Sidhus.
Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, Charanjit Singh Channi and Pargat Singh have also criticized the Chief Minister for not taking action against the culprits involved in the sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib and police firing at Kotkapura and Behbal Kalan.
They also sought action against Sukhbir Singh Badal for allegedly amassing wealth and his role in the sacrilege issue. A round of meetings of those who are seeking action against the culprits of police firing and sacrilege issues took place which irked the Chief Minister and his supporters. Some senior Cabinet Ministers came out in support of the Chief Minister as well.
But the statement of Pargat Singh alleging that he received a threatening call from the political adviser of the Chief Minister, Captain Sandeep Sandhu, asking Pargat Singh to desist from working against the Chief Minister as they had collected all documents against him.
Pargat Singh who is former Olympian and has a clean image took exception to the threatening calls of the Chief Minister’s adviser and maintained that he was simply seeking action against the culprits of the sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib and the police firing and he had not made any personal attack against anyone. Neither the Chief Minister has denied the allegations of Pargat Singh nor Sandeep Singh Sidhu has contradicted him..
In the meantime another development took place as the Punjab Women Commission opened one more than two years old case of alleged harassment of a lady IAS officer and has sought reply from the Chief Secretary Vini Mahajan, failing which she would sit in dharna against Channi. The Chairperson of the State Women Commission can simply ask for the action taken report from the Chief Secretary and cannot make a political statement that she will sit on a dharna.
All these developments have resulted in the collection of five ministers and seven MLAs who gathered at the residence of Charanjit Singh Channi and decided to fight against the alleged harassment to the ministers and MLAs opposing the Chief Minister. Channi also held a meeting of the dalit MLAs at his residence to discuss the promises made with the dalits by the Amarinder Singh government.
Partap Singh Bajwa who has also joined the anti-Amarinder Singh camp and participated in the meeting at the residence of Channi has said they have no agenda to seek change in the leadership of the legislature. They are simply seeking action against those who are involved in the sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib and police firing at Kotkapura and Behbal Kalan.
To demand action against culprits is a no crime as sacrilege of their guru has taken place and Punjab Chief Minister had made a promise that the culprits would be punished. But vindictive action against certain MLAs and Ministers was certainly resentful and ‘We shall go to the party High Command to set the house in order’. Everyone has a freedom to seek action against Badals who have also allegedly amassed huge wealth and committed scams during their rule in Punjab for ten years.
Sunil Jakhar, who is president of the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee with no district units of the Congress under his command is caught badly in the war between the two warring groups. He has announced that there is no vigilance enquiry against Sidhus nor any action was being taken against Charanjit Singh Channi and Pargat Singh.
Punjab Congress has a single man unit with Sunil Jakhar as its president and all district units were dissolved almost two years ago. Congress High Command has not reconstituted the district units despite the upcoming vidhan sabha elections in 2022.
The Congress workers are very much disheartened with the non-functioning of the district units. The other political parties like the Shiromini Akali Dal and the Aam Aadmi Party are mobilizing their cadres for the vidhan sabha polls. Only God can save the Congress.
KS Chawla is a senior journalist based at Ludhiana.
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