Chandigarh, Oct 31 After the Aam Aadmi Party on Saturday announced its first list of 40 candidates for next year’s Punjab elections, the opposition parties in the state claimed the names were announced to prevent the sitting AAP MLAs from switching sides.
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Saturday renominated 40 sitting MLAs from their respective constituencies, including Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann from Dhuri, becoming the first party to declare its candidates for the Punjab polls due early next year.
Speaking to reporters in Delhi, former Punjab Congress chief Amrinder Singh Raja Warring dubbed the AAP list as an attempt to prevent the candidates from switching sides.
The AAP usually announces the candidates first and later changes them, the Ludhiana MP claimed.
“It is only an attempt to stop these candidates from joining other parties,” Warring said.
He also questioned why the names of Punjab AAP president Aman Arora and Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema were not announced in this first list of nominees.
Punjab BJP chief Kewal Singh Dhillon also claimed the AAP made the list of its candidates public because it is worried that they might quit the party.
Congress in-charge for Punjab, Sachin Pilot, claimed that AAP ministers and MLAs have become so infamous that people want a change in the state.
Pilot also claimed that the people of Punjab are fed up with the AAP government and there is a strong anti-incumbency against the Bhagwant Mann regime.
“People are looking at us as a ray of hope. The Congress is the only party which can form the government in Punjab. The rest are only contesting the elections, be it the Akali Dal, BJP or any other party,” he said.
Congress MP and former Punjab chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi accused the AAP government of indulging in corrupt practices.
“There is no need to field a big face against Mann in Dhuri, as any Congress worker can defeat him,” Channi said.
Punjab Congress president Pargat Singh said the AAP’s tall claims of women’s empowerment, honest politics and transparency have “collapsed” at the very first test of ticket distribution.
The party that made grand promises before coming to power has failed to live up to its own claims, Singh said.
“Giving tickets to only four women out of 40 candidates exposes AAP’s anti-women mindset and its hollow claims of respecting women,” Singh said.
The party, which speaks of equal rights and greater political participation for women, pushed them to the margins when it came to distributing tickets, he said.
“AAP must explain why its promise of giving women their rightful place disappeared from its candidate list,” he said.
The Congress leader also said that fielding state minister Sanjeev Arora from Ludhiana West while he is lodged in jail in a money laundering case raised serious questions about AAP’s claims of honest politics.
“The party that came to power in the name of fighting corruption is now backing a leader facing serious charges. The AAP leadership must explain to the people of Punjab where its ethical standards disappear when such decisions are made,” he said.
(PTI News)
