Punjab leaders missing from Cong star campaigners’ list

CHANDIGARH: A list of star campaigners released by the Congress on Wednesday for the upcoming Karnataka assembly elections has no party leader from Punjab with former cabinet minister Navjot Singh Sidhu being the most conspicuous omission from the state.

While Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh Raja Warring, leader of Opposition Partap Singh Bajwa and most other state unit leaders are busy campaigning for the party candidate Karamjit Kaur Chaudhary for the Jalandhar Lok Sabha bypoll, speculations were rife in party circles that Sidhu may be included by the Congress leadership among the star campaigners in the crucial poll battle in Karnataka.

Sidhu’s supporters, who have been angling for a role for the cricketer-turned-politician in the party, were expecting the assembly poll campaign to be an opportunity for him to bounce back after he lost his assembly seat in the 2022 state election and then remained in jail for nearly 10 months in a road rage case. “Sidhu has been a star campaigner for the Congress in many elections right from the time he joined the party in January 2017. I do not know why he has been kept out,” a former MLA said. Another leader from Doaba said the former minister will address at least three to four rallies in Jalandhar in the next few days.

List of campaigners for Jalandhar bypoll out

The Congress also released its list of 40 star campaigners for the May 10 Jalandhar bypoll. Former Punjab CMs Charanjit Singh Channi and Rajinder Kaur Bhattal besides Amarinder Singh Raja Warring, Partap Singh Bajwa, Navjot Singh Sidhu, Ambika Soni, OP Soni, Manish Tewari, Ravneet Singh Bittu, Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot, and HP CM Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu are among them. HTC