Sidhu floats party, breakaway AAP group likely to join hands

Cricketerturned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu floated a new party to fight elections in Punjab next year, a surprise move on a day that also saw a vertical split in the state unit of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

Sidhu joined hands with three top voices against the state’s ruling Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP alliance — former India hockey captain and suspended Akali MLA Pargat Singh and Ludhianabased powerful independent state lawmakers and brothers Simarjeet and Balwinder Singh Bains.

Sidhu’s Awaaz-e-Punjab, or the voice of Punjab, will likely shake up the state’s political landscape so far dominated by the Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP alliance and the opposition Congress and AAP. The move sets at rest speculations that Sidhu and Pargat might join the AAP, which aims to end a decade of Akali-BJP rule in the state, but has been struggling with a crisis over the removal of its local convener Sucha Singh Chhotepur for alleged corruption.

Less than five months before Punjab goes to the high-stakes Assembly polls, a new political landscape has emerged. On Friday, a troika of political renegades, Navjot Sidhu, Pargat Singh and the Bains brothers, dramatically unveiled themselves as a rallying pivot for a fourth front in electoral slugfest that has so far been taking the shape of a threehorse race among the Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP combine, Congress and AAP.

Sidhu’s latest political stroke is a sequel to his ambitious move to play a new inning with AAP coming to a naught. After his resignation as the BJP MP in Rajya Sabha, he found himself left in the lurch. For, Arvind Kejriwal, sure of Sidhu’s diminished bargaining chips and options, played hardball, spurning his demand to be designated as the face of AAP in Punjab.

And, just when Sidhu seemed to have lost the plot, he has sprung a surprise. He has rolled out a loaded dice that is set to unleash new alignments and reshape the electoral slugfest. In his quest for forging a regional political force — christened ‘Awaaz-e-Punjab’ — Sidhu has roped former Indian hockey captain and a sitting Akali MLA Pargat Singh, who was recently suspended by his party for his anti-Sukhir Badal stand, and the Bains brothers — independent legislatures who had rebelled against Akali Dal before the 2012 Assembly polls. A common thread that binds Sidhu’s opening partners is their reputation as trenchant streetfighters against the ruling Badals. And, all were secretly bargaining for a place on the AAP bandwagon, which until recently seemed unstoppable. Not surprisingly, anti-Badalism will be the ringtone of their election strategy to tap into the anti-incumbency ire dogging the 10-year rule of Akali-BJP combine. Right now, however, it’s not for Akali to really worry. Truth be told, the new formation, in fact, has sent shivers down the spines of AAP and Congress.

Sidhu has carefully chosen the timing of his gambit aimed as much at extracting a sweet revenge on AAP as to position himself as a prime pivot of fresh alignments. He has struck vengefully when AAP in Punjab is virtually imploding and has lost much of the steam it had gathered from a deep-seated popular disenchantment against — Akalis and Congress.

Worse, AAP’s Punjab convenor Sucha Singh Chhotepur’s suspension — in the wake of an internally-orchestrated cash-andcarry sting — has led to a vertical split in AAP. The rebel faction is set to make common cause with the Sidhu-led formation. And AAP is staring at more desertions.