AAP’s report card

RS members of AAP

One of the pressing issues that we witnessed in the last week was the non-Punjabi and the businessmen chosen by the AAP government to send to the Upper House of the Indian Parliament (Rajya Sabha, in short RS). The backlash from the non-AAP as well as the AAP supporters were evident on the social media platforms where they raised their concerns over the issue.

There is no official statement given by Bhagwant Mann on this, the newly elected Chief Minister of Punjab from AAP. But on the official Facebook pages of Bhagwant Mann and AAP Punjab numerous people commented on the posts that how the government’s decision wasn’t in the favour of the Punjab; but I’m not able to find these comments now. (A note to myself to take the screenshots in case there is a notorious play of deleting the comments.) AAP supporters seemed very quick to point this out when the news of the RS members spread over the social media.

Newly members who will be sent to the RS include Ashok Mittal (LPU founder), Harbhajan Singh (cricketer), Sanjeev Arora (industrialist), Raghav Chadha (Delhi MLA), and Sandeep Pathak. Ashok Mittal and Sanjeev Arora are named as the businessmen who would never safeguard the rights of Punjab in RS. Harbhajan Singh’s pics of hugging and lifting Nita Ambani from a decade ago when the Mumbai Indians won a cricket match went viral on social media. Harbhajan Singh was accused of having close ties with the Ambani Family, who along with Adani are named to monopolize everything in India. Recently three farm laws were repealed by the Modi government after a year of sit-in protests by the farmers because they believed these giant businessmen would do what they please without looking at the welfare of the farmers. A piece of news from 2009 is also widely shared where Harbhajan Singh admitted that a helicopter was sent for him by the Ambani to fly to Chandigarh while he’s stuck in the curfew. His association with the Ambani Family might be limited to the cricket and has been highly exaggerated to be otherwise, but only the time will tell if the allegations levelled against Harbhajan Singh come true or not. Raghav Chadha has already tried to polarize the Punjabis on religion when he tweeted Sunil Jakhar being ignored by the Congress for the post of Chief Minister merely because he’s a Hindu – he himself has said the same in a rally though. Sandeep Pathak is awarded the RS seat because he designed the Punjab campaign for AAP.

Who knows that the rich guys cheering for AAP might be the Ambani and Adani of the AAP! It’s true that to fight elections you need money. You can’t have a big party with merely crowdfunding. You need people with deep pockets who can flow the cash during the campaigns. AAP has spent enormous amount of money on the advertisement. Just for the swearing-in ceremony of Bhagwant Mann 3 crore rupees were spent.

RS as well as the Punjab Cabinet should consist of those people who have knowledge. You can’t have an agriculturist to look over the economy of the state, or an economist for the education, etc. Dedicated people, who have the knowledge on the matter, should be consulted if not selected. In the words of Neera Chandoke:

Punjab should be nominating knowledgeable candidates who can fight out these issues in the Rajya Sabha and instruct ministers from the Central Government. Punjab’s universities and research centres have a number of distinguished economists; let them go and speak forcefully in the Rajya Sabha on the problems of the state, on the need to generate employment, on environmental issues, on climate change and on MSP. Let them represent Punjab.

 

Official language of Punjab: Punjabi

One who has read the Punjab history knows how the official language of the state was chosen and how some people went against using the Gurmukhi script. But that is in past. A sitting CM and his close acolytes should know Punjab’s official language is Punjabi.

There is a strong note taken by the Punjabi community when the advertisement for the swearing-in ceremony of Bhagwant Mann was shown in Hindi on 15th March 2022 in The Tribune, an English newspaper. There are advertisements given by the non-Punjabi states as well, which are in Hindi. To some extent it makes sense as their official language is Hindi, or they were run by the BJP governments who want to pain the whole country with one language, one culture, and one religion. But for the Punjab Government, it’s very unfortunate and reprimandable act to choose Hindi for the advertisement in the English newspaper. Soon the government seemed to come to their senses because the March 16th advertisement came in English in The Tribune.

Some AAP followers who always defend the party say Hindi advertisement was given in The Tribune because some people won’t understand Punjabi, maybe outsiders who’re working in different fields in Punjab. That is not very much accepted by public because people who know English would buy a copy of The Tribune. A Hindi reader won’t buy an English newspaper just to see Hindi advertisements. It’s better to choose the language of the newspaper. The government should be aware of choosing the language while advertising.

Before the AAP’s win in Punjab, Bhagwant Mann had been tweeting in Hindi. Even after becoming the CM of Punjab, there’re tweets in Hindi[1]. It might be the policy of the AAP to use the Hindi language so that the tweets can be read by non-Punjabi speakers as well. I am aligned with the thought of tweeting in Hindi if there’re non-Punjabi rallies outside of Punjab, like in MP or UP. But when you’re declaring your Cabinet Ministers in the Government of Punjab, you should tweet in Punjabi, not Hindi.

 

Where is Maharaja’s picture?

Within a few days of swearing-in ceremony, the AAP government found itself in a number of controversies. One of them was the removal of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s photo. It’s been alleged that the picture of Maharaja Ranjit Singh was removed and was replaced with the pictures of Bhagat Singh and Dr B. R. Ambedkar in CM’s office. What is the truth in it?

On 16th March, one Facebook page shared the picture of Maharaja Ranjit Singh behind the ex-CMs – Charanjit Singh Channi, Amarinder Singh, and Parkash Singh Badal. But behind the chair of Bhagwant Mann, the wall had the pictures of Bhagat Singh and Dr B. R. Ambedkar as Arvind Kejriwal had said to have the pictures of these two in every government office.

On 19th March, AAP – Punjab official Facebook page shared one picture of the first meeting of the Punjab Cabinet, maybe after the backlash on the social media, where the picture of Maharaja Ranjit Singh was clearly seen behind Bhagwant Mann. So, the AAP followers saved the image and shared across the Facebook pages where the people were accusing the government of removing the picture.

There is another post appeared where it’s said there’re three rooms, and in Bhagwant Mann’s room the picture was removed. That made sense as the 19th March post was showing the picture of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, but not 16th March, which was shared by the AAP – Punjab’s official Facebook page too. It also cleared the doubt where it was pointed out that 16th March picture had the window on the right side of Bhagwant Mann, but not in the other pictures of ex-CM; the reason behind that was the different rooms.

I think the CM office should clear this picture issue.

Always defending the politicians, some of the people also said what is in the picture, when Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s picture was in place nothing extraordinary was done by the earlier government, and people should focus on the work of the government, not these trivial issues. My point is who started the picture row? Why to put the pictures of Bhagat Singh and Dr B. R. Ambedkar at the first place? You should’ve avoided the whole controversy by focusing on the work than displaying the pictures of these two to confirm your nationalistic feelings. I’m not against these two even if I have some reserved thoughts, but one has to realize that there’re certain boundaries you don’t cross when you start a new trend, like removing the heritage of the Sikhs and Punjab.

 

Applauded work

One pension for MLAs is the best decision of the AAP government.

An MLA if wins the seat is entitled to a pension, but if he wins again, he gets a second pension, and so on. There are numerous candidates who’ve won the assembly seats multiple times, think about the salaries that would be drawn by them. According to the news report, first term pension comes to Rs. 75,150, and Rs. 50,100 is added in every term, tax free. There is a catch in this whole pension row.

Before the elections, some have alleged that Parkash Singh Badal had been withdrawing some 8-10 pensions every month because of his winning streak, which was broken by AAP’s Gurmeet Khudian. This piece was circulated hundreds of times on social media if not thousands. Many have believed this because Punjabis are yet to learn how politics work.

According to the news published in The Tribune, an MLA is eligible for pension only when he ceases to be a member of the Assembly. If this is true, then Badal didn’t withdraw the pension as he never lost since 1969. How he withdrew multiple pensions then? It should be noted that Badal’s pension would have been Rs. 5,76,150 after losing in the current elections, but he refused to take it. Badals aren’t the saints but at least the substantiated matters should be picked against them.

We might see increase in the corruption too because it’s not like the old times when after winning the Assembly seat every time you would be given the pension when you lose; now the politicians would try to gather as much money as possible before losing their Assembly seat.

The government should make more of these decisions where the money would be saved, and the Treasury Department wouldn’t be depleted. The money saved with this decision should be used on the welfare of the state.

The removing of the Punjab’s representation from the Bhakhra Beas Management Board and Amit Shah’s announcement that central services rules will be applicable to Chandigarh administration require great attention of the Punjab government. There’re certain decisions made by the Punjab government – only time will tell how they would actually help people – but the government, especially the AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal, should never forget that if the identity and the powers of the Punjab are taken away by the Centre government, and state government keeps mum, Punjabis won’t care about your freebies and welfare schemes. Last few incidents mentioned in this article confirmed that Punjab is not Delhi.

---

[1] पंजाब का नया मंत्रिमंडल कल शपथ ग्रहण करेगा। पंजाब की AAP सरकार में होने वाले सभी मंत्रियों को बहुत-बहुत शुभकामनाएँ।

पंजाब की जनता ने हम सबको बहुत बड़ी ज़िम्मेदारी दी है, हमें दिन-रात मेहनत कर लोगों की सेवा करनी है, पंजाब को एक ईमानदार सरकार देनी है। हमें रंगला पंजाब बनाना है।

 

आज़ादी के 75 साल बाद भी हमारे लोग कतारों में खड़े हैं। आज हम ये सिस्टम बदलने जा रहे हैं। अब हमारी बुजुर्ग माताओं को राशन के लिए घंटो लाइन में नहीं लगना पड़ेगा। किसी को अपनी दिहाड़ी नहीं छोड़नी पड़ेगी। आज मैंने फैसला लिया है कि आपकी सरकार आपके घर राशन पहुंचाएगी।

Punjab elections 2022

Unexpected.

The results clearly show that AAP’s winning seats were unexpected and exceptionally well. No party in the history of the elections in Punjab won that many seats after 1966. The near number that we saw was in 1992 when the Congress won 87 seats.

Today, the Punjabis have shown how much tired they were from the main political parties – SAD and Congress. The results which are pouring in at the time of writing this shows the difference of the votes between the winning and trailing candidates, and the numbers were in thousands.

 

Every player lost, and results

You name it, Parkash Singh Badal, Captain Amrinder Singh, Sukhbir Singh Badal, Bikram Singh Majhitia, Navjot Singh Sindhu, Charanjit Singh Channi, Ranjit Singh Brahmpura, Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa, etc., every single one of them lost. Even the Sacha Sauda Dera couldn’t help the parties to win the elections.

The results of this elections clearly tell without the political knowledge you can’t win the elections. SSM had his players on the ground, but they couldn’t win any seats. In hindsight, one may figure protesting against the establishment and winning the elections are two different things. If SSM had some big politicians among them, or if they had shaken hands with a political party, as it’s conjectured but Balbir Singh Rajewal clarified it’s not the case, there might be some chances of winning. But they had nothing to show how they would transform the lives of people. In the case of AAP, they had the ‘Delhi Model’ to lure the public. It’s evident that SSM had no chance.

BJP, as I have written before the elections, had two key issues to speak on: Ram Mandir and the Hindu issues. The Hindu population of Punjab had shown that the Punjabi Hindus can see through the deceit and know what’s best for the state of Punjab. If we look at some of the other Indian States, we see the winning streak of BJP is due to the unnecessary Hindu-Muslim debates and issues. And Hindutva too. The news was there were some posters walled in the Punjab that the vote should be for Ram Mandir[1]. It was clearly to polarize the Punjabis on the ground of religions. But the Hindus saw through it. Punjab is the perfect example to show that you can’t get the votes by bringing only the religious issues, and there is no guarantee that a particular religion is going to vote for a particular party.

SAD. Sukhbir Singh Badal should step down from the presidency. If they don’t want to get wiped out from the political map of Punjab, they should allow a non-Badal to run the party and decide how they are going to revive this grand old party. The legacy of the party should survive. Badals’ contribution to the party or Punjab is negated by the decisions they’d made about their alliances and issues. SAD, which won 75 seats in 1997, got only 3 seats in 2022! Something went wrong down the road. It needs to be changed. They should look holistically about the betterment of the party and Punjab than their individual political careers.

Congress’ performance wasn’t as I’d expected. The decisions that Charanjit Singh Channi made during his small stint as the CM of Punjab weren’t good enough for the Punjabis. Many believe if the decision of changing the CM after Amarinder Singh’s resignation was made two years early the map of Congress’ winning seats would’ve been different. The CM himself lost his seats.

For AAP, it’s a different game. The results are in parallel with the General Elections of 2019 – the votes weren’t going for the candidates but Modi – similarly the votes in 2022 Punjab Assembly Elections weren’t for the individual candidates but AAP. Those candidates who didn’t have anything in the spectrum of politics won too because of the wave of AAP. That is, what I would call, a sheep wave.

 

What went wrong for SAD?

People have been blaming the Badals for the sacrilege of Guru Granth Sahib ji in 2015 and the firing on the protesting Sikhs. This was the biggest blow to the SAD. Although none of them have been in jail for this. But the general perception has been built on the social media about the involvement of Badals in these incidents during their government in Punjab.

Second is the decline of the Sikh Ethos among the members of the SAD. We don’t see them raising their voices on the panthis issues or the Punjab issues, which were the core things before Parkash Singh Badal turned the party into a secular one in 1996 Moga conclave.

One must remember the history of the Sikh Kingdom that the raaj was of Khalsa – the government was Sarkar-e-Khalsa – but still the rule was secular. You need not change the 100-year-old party’s ethos to lure the non-Sikhs. You can still be a Sikh political party working for all irrespective of their religions.

There have been ties with the core Hindu parties, political and non-political, which have been speaking against the Sikh struggle in 1980s-90s and paint the Sikh religion with their Hindu philosophy. This didn’t go well among the Sikhs. This issue has been raised by the non-political Sikhs for years, but nothing was changed. So, eventually, SAD leaders reaped what they sowed.

Third was the showcase of their contributions in the recent times. AAP was way ahead of the dissemination of what they have done in Delhi than SAD.

Fourth was no fruitful efforts were made to bring new industries in Punjab to generate new jobs. People have alleged that the Badals demanded a fair share if the industries wanted lands to open their plants in Punjab was the reason for no new industry in Punjab. These were some serious allegations that the SAD leaders need to answer.

Fifth was the no new faces at the top hierarchy. Someone should replace Parkash Singh Badal and Sukhbir Singh Badal. The Badal dynasty learned nothing from the Congress. They are in this situation because they kept everything within the family. SAD is not for Badal’s progenies. Those who can run the party efficiently should be the president. SAD (Sanyukt)’s president, Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa, has submitted his resignation, and asked Sukhbir Singh Badal to do the same.

With this crushing defeat, the Jathedar of Akal Takhat, Giani Harpreet Singh, asked all the SAD factions to come together at Akal Takhat for the future course. This is big. This is so big. If a plan has to be outlined, everyone should be onboarded, Badals should take the moral responsibility to step down from the top hierarchy, put combined efforted to come back in power with a bang. Giani Harpreet Singh said it beautifully:

Shromani Akali Dal isn’t a political party but a thought (soch). If that thought is alive, Shromani Akali Dal is alive. That’s why it’s very important to revive that thought.

I can bet if the SAD transforms into who it was, there won’t be any other political party that can make government in Punjab because the SAD will be walking on the path shown by the Gurus and work for all.

 

A long road for AAP

‘Give us a chance.’ That was the slogan by AAP.

You have gotten one.

We all heard the infrastructure of government schools in Delhi and AAP’s contribution to that. In Punjab, it might be a challenging thing for AAP as there are thousands of villages and the similar number of schools in cities and villages if not the same. How they will contribute to change that will be good to see.

Secondly, there should be industries brought into Punjab. It’s been long alleged that the industries didn’t come to Punjab because the Badals asked for partnership. Now, as AAP, a ‘good’ party, will be running the show, they should showcase how it’s done. And the industries shouldn’t be to do the minimal jobs but where the college pass-outs can earn good money. Of course, the land should be required for that, but it need not be with force, or bad decisions.

Thirdly, the drug and sacrilege issues in Punjab, which Kejriwal had ignored in his interview, should be resolved by AAP. Bikramjit Singh Majhithia is already going to court for the drug case. We will see how under AAP that case reaches its end results. In Ludhiana, there were big billboards of Captain Amarinder Singh when he was the CM of Punjab that how many criminals were put behind the bars or drug cases solved. Everybody knows the truth of that. AAP should avoid it.

During the 2017 Punjab Assembly Elections, the words were spread that if AAP won Punjab in 2017, Arvind Kejriwal would be the CM of Punjab as the CM of Delhi doesn’t quite have the powers to make the decisions because of its being a union territory. Similarly, people are assuming his wife or the Deputy CM of Delhi or some other person will become the CM of Punjab even when Bhagwant Mann is the chosen candidate. Maybe down the road, we will see how the events turn out to be. A full five years for Bhagwant Mann would shut all the mouths.

It should be noted that AAP being a state party was able to win another state. Some are willing to call it a national party. I wrote back in 2019 that the Sikh political parties try to move to other states to form the government. Here AAP seems to go in that direction, on the other hand Sikh political party like SAD lost its own state to the lowest assembly seats.

There are chances that the Deputy CM or Cabinet Ministers will have a share of Hindus in the AAP government in Punjab, so that AAP can prepare themselves for the next elections too. The recent killing of cows in Hoshiarpur might be used by some people to polarize the state. Only time will tell how these situations will be handled by the AAP government and if they are really a B team of BJP.

Punjabis have chosen their destiny for the next five years, let’s hope AAP won’t disappoint them.

---

[1] “Jo Ram ko laaye hai hum unko laenge.” “Is baare vote sirf Ram Mandir ko.”