JALANDHAR: Three days before Punjab goes to polls on February 20, the narrative has taken a quick turn, bearing a striking similarity with the 2017 elections. It’s about peace and communal harmony in the state, and there is an implicit as well as explicit focus on creating a perception of fear among Hindus.
In 2017, AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal’s stay at a Sikh NRI’s house just weeks before polls and the Maur blast just four days before the polls were the centre of focus. On Wednesday, former AAP leader Kumar Vishwas alleged Kejriwal was hobnobbing with ‘Sikh radicals’. He alleged that the AAP national convener wanted to be either chief minister of Punjab or the PM of an independent country. However, the AAP has reacted strongly and rubbished the claims as “defamatory, malicious, unfounded, fabricated and inflammatory”. It also questioned why Vishwas, who was once its significant leader, had been silent on this till now.
