Be courageous, answer call of conscience: Bajwa to Congmen

We will meet MPs, former state unit chiefs and other senior leaders followed by the chief minister on Thursday or Friday.

HARISH RAWAT, Congress’ Punjab affairs in-charge

CHANDIGARH: A day before the three-member committee is scheduled to start meeting leaders from Punjab to try and end factionalism in the state unit, Congress Rajya Sabha member Partap Singh Bajwa on Sunday urged his party colleagues to be courageous and answer the call of their conscience.

Bajwa, who is among the party leaders carrying out antiAmarinder tirade over the sacrilege-related cases and other poll promises, said the Almighty and people of Punjab were watching. “Be courageous and answer the call of your conscience. The almighty and people of Punjab are watching,” he tweeted even as more than two dozen party ministers and MLAs reached Delhi to meet the panel headed by leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge.

All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary in-charge of Punjab affairs Harish Rawat and former Delhi Congress president Jai Prakash Agarwal are the other members of the committee constituted by Congress president Sonia Gandhi to resolve the rift in Punjab unit where Bajwa, former minister Navjot Singh Sidhu and halfa-dozen other leaders have been targeting chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh over the legal setback in the Kotkapura police firing case.

The committee, which has decided to meet the chief minister, ministers, present and ex-state unit chiefs, MPs, MLAs and other leaders one by one, will start the exercise with Punjab Congress president Sunil Jakhar and then meet two dozen ministers and MLAs, half of them from Malwa region, on Monday to hear their suggestions and grievances. Several cabinet ministers, including the two who are discontented with the CM’s handling of sacrilege cases, are among those scheduled to meet the panel on day one.

Ex-minister Navjot Singh Sidhu and Jalandhar Cantonment MLA Pargat Singh, both among Amarinder’s most strident critics in the state Congress, are scheduled to meet Kharge and others on Tuesday.

“We will meet MPs, former state unit chiefs and other senior leaders thereafter followed by the chief minister on Thursday or Friday in all probability,” Rawat said. While former Congress president Rahul Gandhi has called up a few party leaders, including ministers and MLAs, for first-hand feedback, some MLAs and MPs have made request for an audience with him while they are in Delhi to meet the three-member panel.

The assembly polls are due in the state early next year.