Party will suffer if Sidhu is made state unit chief: Captain to Sonia
CHANDIGARH: Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh wrote to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi on Friday and expressed displeasure at the party’s handling of infighting in the state unit, said people aware of developments, signalling an escalation in the crisis engulfing the party months before polls.
The letter by an upset chief minister also mentioned resentment brewing in the state unit, and cautioned that if his rival and trenchant critic, Navjot Singh Sidhu, is appointed Punjab Congress chief, it could lead to a split in the party, said the people quoted above.
Singh’s letter was delivered to the Congress president at her 10, Janpath residence in Delhi before she met cricketer-turned-politician Sidhu on Friday afternoon, the people added.
The letter came after two days of meetings and intense speculation of rapprochement between the rival factions in Punjab Congress – party leaders had on Thursday said that broad contours of a revamp plan had been drafted - and indicated that the crisis, which first surfaced in May, was far from resolution.
It marks a personal shift in strategy by Singh, who until now had not responded to Sidhu’s public attacks, and met twice with a party panel set up to defuse the tension. A member of that panel, party general secretary Harish Rawat, will meet Singh on Saturday in Chandigarh.
The two-time chief minister’s missive delivered by his officer on special duty (Osd-delhi) Narender Bhambri also indicated that Singh, who met two dozen ministers, MPS and MLAS loyal to him in last 48 hours, dug in his heels.
On Thursday, the party cleared the air about Singh’s role, saying he will continue as chief minister and lead the party in the next elections, scheduled in early 2022. The 79-year-old leader met Gandhi on July 6.
Officially, Gandhi is yet to take a call on the role of Sidhu, around whom the opposition to Singh has coalesced and grown in recent months. But there has been a lot of talk that Sidhu may be appointed the next Punjab Congress chief, overriding Singh’s strong objections.
It is these speculations that prompted Singh to write the strongly worded letter, said the people quoted in the first instance.
In the letter, Singh conveyed his displeasure over reports of Sidhu’s “impending appointment” as the state unit chief. He told Gandhi that senior leaders and traditional Congressmen would object to any such move and even cautioned the central leadership about the likelihood of a split in the party in such an eventuality.
Separately, he also raised questions over Sidhu’s style of working.
Sidhu, who quit the state cabinet after the chief minister changed his portfolio in 2019, wants to head Punjab’s Congress unit – a position that will give him significant powers ahead of the assembly elections.
But Singh is strongly opposed to having Sidhu, a Jat Sikh like him, in the top party position in the state and has repeatedly advocated for a Hindu face for the position.
Sidhu, who joined the Congress in 2017, appears to be close to former party president Rahul Gandhi and general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, both of whom he met on June 30.
Tensions between Singh and Sidhu have simmered since 2019 but the bitterness mounted in May after the government suffered a legal setback in a 2015 case of police firing on a crowd protesting the desecration of the Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh holy book.
Sidhu and some leaders publicly accused Singh of allowing corruption, prompting the Congress to set up the three-member panel.
The panel met around 150 functionaries – including Singh twice -and submitted its report to Gandhi on June 10. The panel recommended that Singh retain charge but Sidhu be accommodated in a key role. There has been little public progress since.