At the penultimate hour, just before the deadline for filing nominations, the Congress announced that Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi will contest from a second seat, apart from Chamkaur Sahib, which he has won thrice since 2007. The Bhadaur Assembly constituency in Barnala district was chosen. Bhadaur is one of the nine Assembly segments under the Sangrur Lok Sabha constituency, which the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) chief ministerial candidate Bhagwant Mann has won twice. Mr. Mann is the sitting Member of Parliament from this seat.
On paper, the decision comes across as bold. In the last 55 years, the Congress has won the seat only twice — in 1967 and in 2012. The Congress looks willing to take on the AAP on its turf. Moreover, Mr. Channi has proved that he is a serious contender for the crown.
But there’s a yawning chasm between the backroom strategising and ground realities. While voters are happy that their constituency is receiving attention because of Mr. Channi’s candidature, they feel they have little else to thank the incumbent Congress government for. Two strands of conversation are repeated over and over again. One, that Mr. Channi is an “outsider” who is “here only temporarily”. While they appreciate Mr. Channi’s 111-day-long tenure as CM, they do not see it completely divorced from the four-and-a-half-year reign of former Chief Minister Captain (retd.) Amarinder Singh. The desire for change that’s the overriding narrative in these Assembly elections echoes here, too.
