Shwait Malik faction cold-shoulders Sampla at BJP’S Jalandhar padyatra
JALANDHAR: Fissures within the state unit of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) became apparent on Tuesday when Union minister Vijay Sampla was given a cold shoulder by the faction led by state president Shwait Malik at an event in Jalandhar.
The party state leadership started padyatra in Jalandhar to protest against Capt Amarinder Singh-led Congress government in Punjab.
Even as Sampla and Shwait shared the stage while giving the slogan “Congress Gaddi Chhodo (Congress leave the seat of power), they parted ways after three minutes.
Malik and Sampla were to jointly kick-start the event after paying tributes to Mahatma Gandhi and Lal Bahadur Shastri on their birth anniversary. While Malik, accompanied by former minister Manoranjan Kalia and former MLA KD Bhandari, paid tributes to Gandhi and Shastri by garlanding their statues, Sampla chose to sit back on the stage.
Malik after addressing the gathering briefly went to start the ‘padyatra’ without asking Sampla to come along. Sampla also chose not to accompany him and left for the local circuit house to interact with the mediapersons.
Interestingly, even the hoardings of ‘padyatra’ installed outside Company Garden had pictures of Malik and other state BJP leaders but not of Sampla, a Union minister.
The hoardings had pictures of PM Modi, BJP national president Amit Shah and finance minister Arun Jaitley and pictures of Akali Dal leaders Parkash Singh Badal and Sukhbir Singh Badal besides the local BJP unit.
A senior BJP leader seeking anonymity agreed that there is “something wrong” between the Shwait Malik and Sampla. “Malik was made the president of the state party unit there against Sampla’s wish. Since Sampla is a Union minister and a senior party leader, his photos should have been there on the hoardings,” he said.
BJP district president Raman Pabbi said the format of the hoardings was decided by the state committee.