Rohit Kumar
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) announced on Tuesday that Bhagwant Mann, the party’s Punjab president and Lok Sabha MP, would be the party’s chief ministerial candidate in the Assembly election, with the national committee chair and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal saying his choice was based on “popular perception” accumulated through mobile phone (cell) votes.
The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) accused the AAP of organizing a “phony scam and puppet show” by staging a “fake telephonic poll.”
“We invited Punjabis to vote for their preferred Chief Minister, and the party had issued a cell phone number where people could communicate their preferences.” There had been 21,59,437 votes cast, with Bhagwant Mann receiving 93.3 percent of the vote. “With 3.6 percent of the vote, Navjot Singh Sidhu finished in second,” he stated at a Mohali event.
Following the announcement, Mr. Mann stated that Punjab understands how to recover from difficult times and that the people should not lose hope. “The AAP’s strategy is to eradicate narcotics from Punjab while also providing work and decent education for our kids, and I’ll celebrate only when we’ve accomplished all of these objectives,” he stated.
Mr. Mann, a two-term member of the Lok Sabha, was a well-known Punjabi comedian. In 2011, he joined the Punjab People’s Party, which brought him into mainstream politics. In 2014, he switched from the PPP and joined the AAP, contesting the parliamentary elections from Sangrur, where he won for the first time. In 2019, he won the seat for his party for the second time, becoming the only candidate from Punjab to do so. This aided his rise in the party’s ranks and prominence.
Mr. Mann (48), too, had his share of controversy. He took a video in the Parliament complex in 2016 as an MP and shared it on social media, for which he later apologized. His opponents have frequently accused him of being an “alcoholic.” He was accused of showing up inebriated on public occasions. Mr. Mann came to Parliament under the influence of alcohol, according to suspended AAP MP Harinder Khalsa, who reported to then-Speaker Sumitra Mahajan. Mr. Mann pledged to never drink again at an AAP event in 2019.
Mr. Mann stated that he entered politics just to restore Punjab’s riches and glory. “I have raised my voice for Punjab and its people on every stage, from the road to Parliament, and I will continue to do so.” “When I become Chief Minister, I’ll use the power that the people have given me to work for the people,” he stated.
“People of Punjab are being ditched by the present Congress government,” says Mr. Mann.
Sukhbir Singh Badal, president of the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), said the AAP had resorted to compromised candidate Bhagwant Mann because no one else was willing to lead it in Punjab.
“Mr. Kejriwal never sought to make Mr. Mann the face of the party, he said, describing the nomination as a “stage-managed non-event.”
He’s been telling Mann that while claiming that the party was seeking for a competent candidate.” It’s also true that the AAP contacted a number of potential candidates, but each of them has declined to lead the party. This is why, following a fictitious survey, Bhagwant has been entrusted with the task,” added Mr. Badal.
Harcharan Bains, the SAD president’s principal adviser, said the AAP had won its first “phony CM face,” but now it was time for Punjab to elect its actual Chief Minister. Mr. Kejriwal, he claimed, had long intended to use a phone to manage Punjabis from Delhi, and while this phone idea was excellent, it was solely for regulating the AAP’s inner circus.
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