Past Punjab’s revolving door, ‘new BJP’ is the ‘old Congress’

Amarinder, who belongs to the erstwhile Patiala ruling family, then floated the Punjab Lok Congress and contested the 2022 Assembly polls in alliance with the BJP but failed to open his account. He subsequently joined the BJP with his daughter Jai Inder Kaur, merging his outfit with it.

Currently, Amarinder is a member of the BJP’s National Executive while Jai Inder is the party’s Mahila Morcha president and a member of the state campaign committee.

Earlier this month, Amarinder’s wife and Patiala MP, Preneet Kaur, who was suspended by the Congress last year, also joined the BJP. She is likely to be fielded by the BJP from her seat.

“Many more leaders, not only from the Congress but even from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) will join the BJP in coming weeks,” a party leader said.

Apart from the erstwhile royals, the Congress got a setback in May 2022, when its ex-state president Sunil Jakhar shifted to the BJP. He is now the Punjab BJP chief. Jakhar made scathing remarks while quitting the Congress, saying it had no intention to save itself despite facing an existential crisis. Jakhar was said to have been miffed with the party for not making him the CM after Amarinder’s resignation as senior leader Ambika Soni, who had declined the CM’s post herself, had insisted on a Sikh face for the post.

Since his switch to the BJP, Jakhar has been building his own team. The state BJP executive committee constituted by him includes many ex-Congressmen. “Many Sikh faces in the panel are from the Congress, helping the BJP project a secular face before the masses,” a party leader said.

Jakhar has been all praise for Prime Minister Narendra Modi for “doing so much for Punjab”. “Modi opened the Kartarpur corridor, ensured every single grain of wheat and paddy is procured from farmers, observed Veer Bal Diwas to commemorate Guru Gobind Singh’s martyred sons. He wants to do much more and we need to strengthen his hands,” he has maintained, repeating it Tuesday while announcing that the BJP will contest the Lok Sabha polls in the state alone.

The BJP also welcomed ex-Congress MLA Fateh Jang Bajwa, brother of Leader of the Opposition Partap Singh Bajwa, into its fold in December 2021. Fateh contested the 2022 Assembly elections from Batala as a BJP nominee but finished at fourth position.

Punjab BJP secretary Harjot Kamal Singh, a former Congress MLA from Moga, joined the party ahead of the 2022 Assembly polls after being denied a ticket by the grand old party. He had a long association with the Congress and served in its several positions. He contested the 2022 polls from Moga on the BJP ticket and like Fateh, came in fourth position.

The state BJP’s core committee too has a significant number of former Congress leaders including ex-MLAs Arvind Khanna and Kewal Dhillon, and ex-ministers Manpreet Singh Badal and Rana Gurmeet Singh Sodhi.

While Khanna quit the Congress in January 2022 and unsuccessfully contested as a BJP candidate from Sangrur, Dhillon switched to the BJP in June and was named its nominee for the Sangrur parliamentary bypoll, where he finished fourth.

Badal, who is facing vigilance inquiry for allegedly converting two commercial plots of land into residential in Model Town area of Bathinda during his tenure as finance minister, joined the BJP in January 2023.

Other Congress turncoats like former MLAs Balbir Singh Sidhu, Raj Kumar Verka, Gurpreet Singh Kangar and Sunder Shyam Arora had joined the BJP in June 2022 and were accommodated in the party’s state executive. However, except Arora, all of them returned to the Congress in October last year.

The BJP also has a host of former SAD leaders in its ranks. Kanwarveer Singh Tohra, grandson of former Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) president Gurcharan Singh Tohra, is the state in-charge of the party’s youth wing. He contested the Amloh Assembly seat in 2022 as a BJP candidate and lost.

State BJP vice-president Jagdeep Singh Nakai is a former SAD MLA. A three-time MLA and ex-SAD leader Mohinder Kaur Josh joined the BJP in 2022.