BJP sees major churning in Punjab politics after Jalandhar LS bypoll verdict
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, May 18: The Bharatiya Janata Party came fourth in the Jalandhar Lok Sabha bypoll. Yet, the saffron outfit is jubilant and party leaders claimed that Jalandhar verdict has given a booster dose to the BJP to become the second pole in the state politics.
“The BJP contested the Lok Sabha election from Jalandhar for the first time. The BJP took lead in two out of the nine Assembly seats in the Jalandhar parliamentary constituency. The bottomline is that only the Aam Aadmi Party and the BJP had leads in the Assembly seats within the Jalandhar parliamentary constituency,” the BJP national general secretary Tarun Chugh said.
Incidentally, the Congress lost the Jalandhar parliamentary seat for the first time in 24 hours. The bypoll was necessitated after the Congress MP Santokh Singh Chaudhary had died of a massive cardiac arrest while taking part in the Bharat Jodo Yatra led by former Congress president Rahul Gandhi. “The Congress lost the Jalandhar Lok Sabha seat after 24 years. This shows the trend of the churn in Punjab politics. The people in the state are looking with hopes at Prime Minister Narendra Modi as drugs and guns are making the people in the state highly concerned,” added Chugh.
Incidentally, the BJP despite coming fourth is drawing confidence from the fact that neither the Congress nor the Shiromani Akali Dal could manage lead in any of the nine Assembly seats in the Jalandhar parliamentary constituency. The bypoll verdict showed sharp Hindu vote consolidation in favour of the BJP.
The AAP wrested the seat from the Congress to assert party’s domination in the state politics. Also, the SAD, while coming third, has become aware that the party will need to get back to an alliance, as despite the pre-poll tie up with the Bahujan Samaj Party, it couldn’t dent the AAP vote base. The BJP fancies that the party can now take a higher stake in the event the SAD decides to return to the NDA fold in the near future, while taking note of the ground reality in Punjab. Speculation is rife that the BJP could strike an alliance with the SAD on 50:50 formula on the basis of the strength gained from the induction of veterans from the ranks of the Congress in the state. Incidentally, Punjab is among a few states where the BJP has so far not been able to cut much ice despite the saffron outfit making inroads in several new territories.
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