Fighting for a third term and versus first-time AAP, Akalis have back to the wall
“WE HAVE always been Akalis, and will remain Akalis,” said a man outside a store as Congress workers streamed past for a rally that AICC vice-president Rahul Gandhi was coming to address in this village on Thursday.
Sitting next to him, his friend smiled enigmatically, before others in the group pointed to him and said: “He is a Congressman.” A young man cut in: “Let them say whatever they want. Chalna tau jhadoo hi hai (AAP’s symbol broom will hold sway).”
In Akali stalwart Parkash Singh Badal’s fiefdom, where Punjab Congress leader Amarinder Singh is taking on the Chief Minister in a contest billed as Saturday’s “mahayuddh”, this casual exchange between Lambi village.
Even a few hours before Punjab starts voting Saturday in the 117-seat Vidhan Sabha election, the race, the first three-cornered one in the state — between the SAD-BJP alliance, the Congress and new entrant AAP — is proving tough even for pollsters to predict.
Voter resentment against the ruling alliance is high and, despite every effort by SAD president and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal to ensure a “hat trick”, their return to power for a third term seems unlikely.
Even here in Lambi, which Chief Minister Badal has nurtured over so many years, Amarinder is putting up a tough fight, and AAP’s Jarnail Singh has made inroads.
Many homes in the village are flying Congress flags. “The Akalis have destroyed my son, he is a drug addict. He will vote for Akali. But many of us women in Lambi have decided to vote for Congress,” said Sharmeet Kaur.
Her daughter-in-law is a qualified teacher, but did not get a government job. “We had to start a tuition centre at home so she wouldn’t waste her qualification,” said Sharmeet.
The easy availability of narcotic drugs, widespread addiction and unemployment have been the big issues this election. Corruption, the government’s failure to solve the incidents of desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib, a perceived breakdown of law and order, agrarian distress, and the “Badalisation” of Akali Dal have also created an anti-incumbent sentiment.
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