Six days after the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) swept the Punjab Assembly polls, Bhagwant Mann was sworn in as the Chief Minister on March 16, with his 10 party colleagues taking oath as ministers on March 19. During the last six months of its tenure, the AAP-led Punjab government has been troubled by various rows. Here is a look at six major controversies involving AAP MLAs and ministers that erupted during this period. On May 24, Mann shocked everyone by sacking his then health minister Vijay Singla on charges of corruption. The CM said that Singla, a dentist by profession, had demanded 1 per cent commission in the tenders floated by his department and that he had its “audio proof”. Mann said Singla had even confessed his offence to him. The audio clip was recorded during a sting operation in which Singla's OSD was purportedly heard seeking “shukrana (commission)” on the sanctioned government contracts. Singla was arrested by the police, but was released on bail on July 8. He has again become politically active in his area, although he has not been seen meeting any of his AAP MLA colleagues publicly since. On July 4, Mann undertook his cabinet expansion, appointing Chetan Singh Jouramajra, a first-time MLA from the Samana constituency of Patiala district, as the health and family welfare minister. A class 12 pass, Jouramajra drew criticism from his detractors who questioned why he was picked as the health minister despite the fact that nine doctor candidates had won the elections on the AAP ticket. On July 29, Jauramajra landed in a controversy as he ordered Dr Raj Bahadur, the then Vice chancellor of Baba Farid University of Health Sciences (BFUHS), to lie on a dirty mattress in front of camera during his visit to the Guru Gobind Singh Medical College and Hospital in Faridkot and rebuked him for having poor services in a major government hospital. Dr Bahadur resigned soon after this incident with the government appointing an officiating V-C a week later as the former refused to withdraw his resignation despite the CM urging him not to do so. The CM also said that the MLAs should be civil with officials and should stop live-streaming their inspection visits. On September 11, food processing minister Fauja Singh Sarari, a retired cop and first time MLA from Guru-Har-Sahai constituency of Ferozepur district, was caught in a controversy after an audio clip of a conversation allegedly between him and his OSD Tarsem Lal Kapoor went viral in which the two could be purportedly heard planning to “trap” some contractors involved in foodgrain transport through some officials to extort money from them. Their one-minute-forty-seconds audio that went viral is a conversation about catching the contractors when the half-loading of grain in trucks in done. It also says that a part of the commission should go to the district food and civil supplies controller and that the truck driver should not be caught. Another voice which is said to be that of Tarsem Lal Kapoor says that one DRO copy is needed which is issued 15 days prior to the grain loading and that it is difficult to get that copy. The voice at the other end says that “should we gherao on our own”? “No, why should you go?” comes the voice from the other end. Sarari had been avoiding media queries after the row, although on September 11 he told a reporter that “edited audio” was made viral by someone. Meanwhile, an FIR had been lodged against Johny Kapoor, nephew of Tarsem, for using the national flag on his private vehicle and that two days later the audio clip had gone viral. Sources said Kapoors used to take care of Sarari's constituency in his absence but after the registration of this FIR the latter had refused to help them. Sources also said Tarsem had a closed-door meeting with Sarari on September 13 in Chandigarh. The Opposition has been demanding the removal of Sarari, even as a leading advocate of the Punjab and Haryana High Court HC Arora has written to the CM urging him to sack Sarari within ten days or he will move the high court to seek a CBI probe into the case. The AAP's chief spokesperson Malwinder Singh Kang said, "Aam Aadmi Party has zero tolerance towards corruption and no one is spared if found guilty. We have taken a serious note of the audio and inquiry at internal level has already been started by the party as well as Punjab government. If he (Sarari) will be found guilty even by 1%, he will not be spared." Ministers Harpal Singh Cheema and Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer echoed similar views, even as Kang also said that "We are checking the authenticity of the audio as these days lots of edited videos as well as audios are coming and many people mimic others' style of speaking and voice tone as well.. hence we need to verify all the aspects, which are being done on our own.” Some AAP MLAs were also mired in controversies due to their personal lives such as the case of Sanaur MLA Harmeet Singh Pathanmajra, who has been in a spot over bigamy and an “intimate video” in a row that erupted in the third week of August. On the Pathanmajra row, Kang said, "It is the personal life of the MLA. However the party will seek an explanation from the MLA. I feel that public representatives should be disciplined and hold up moral values." Pathanmajra, who had been with the Akali Dal and the Congress earlier, claimed that even Delhi CM and AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal was aware that he had two wives before he had joined the AAP and that his first wife had given him permission to marry for the second time with one Gurpreet Kaur with whom he was in a relationship for over 10 years. Pathanmajra had married for the second time in August last year. However, an FIR has been recently lodged against Gurpreet Kaur for allegedly leaking an “intimate video” without Pathanmajra's permission and defaming him while no action has been taken against the MLA on her complaints. It has been learnt that his second wife has also moved the high court. The two-time MLA from Bathinda's Talwandi Sabo constituency, Baljinder Kaur, was in the news early September after a CCTV footage dated July 10 went viral in which her husband Sukhraj Singh Bal, an AAP leader, had been seen assaulting her. Kaur did not give her reaction over this video, refraining from complaining to the police about the incident. The AAP also kept mum, calling it a “personal matter” of the MLA. Sukhraj Singh Bal was a student leader from Amritsar, who joined the AAP in 2016. He was the convener of the AAP's Majha zone youth wing, although after his marriage with Kaur in February 2019 he had confined himself mainly to Talwandi Sabo. On September 8, the ED raided the premises of the AAP's Amargarh MLA Jaswant Singh Gajjan Majra. It was said that a 76-crore loan had been outstanding against his companies and various directors including him. He had also faced the CBI searches in May this year. The AAP's information and public relations minister Aman Arora had called the agencies' action against him “political vendetta” at the behest of the BJP which, he alleged, was in a state of “shock” in view of the “rising graph” of the AAP in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh. On his part, projecting the AAP government's “accomplishments”, Malwinder Singh Kang said, "Ever since the AAP came to power, we have done so many remarkable reforms i.e. we have regularised many employees in government departments, fulfilled our guarantee of 300 units free power per month, tax revenue has jumped remarkably and so on, we have taken action against so many corrupt officers and even against our own minister. However, the Opposition has no substantive issue to talk about as our government is working with full dedication, hence they are busy talking about the personal lives of MLAs. I repeat that AAP has zero tolerance towards corruption and if any charges are established against anyone, the person will not be spared."
