Punjab Elections: The Politics Behind Chief Ministerial Candidates or Lack Thereof

After waiting in the wings for several years, now that Bhagwant Mann has been made the chief ministerial candidate of the Aam Admi Party (AAP) in Punjab, it seems as if the party has finally ticked all the boxes and is going into the election, best foot forward. The party is contesting the election on the strength of the Arvind Kejriwal brand of governance, but having a true blue Jatt Sikh as its face fills a critical gap in its strategy as it tries its luck once again in a state that tripped its ambitions once before in 2017.

At that time, AAP went into the election without a CM candidate and Kejriwal himself lurked in the shadows as a possible post election slip-in. Those were also the days when Mann had a serious problem with alcoholism and the party’s Delhi leadership was not keen to project him, more so, because videos of him in an inebriated condition were all over social media. Some of those videos will still be circulated by the opposition to run him down, but this is a decidedly sober Bhagwant Mann that Punjab is seeing now.

He gave up alcohol in 2019 and in his speeches – still laced with earthy Punjabi humour that draws in the crowds – he is talking of re-building Punjab, preventing the exodus of its youth to foreign lands and improving the health and education infrastructure. Issues that connect strongly with Punjabis rooting for ‘change’ in Punjab this time. It is also worth pointing out that Mann is among the few who has remained loyal to Kejriwal even when most of AAP’s senior leadership in Punjab deserted the party after the electoral loss in 2017. In many ways, he seems to have passed the loyalty test in a party that is often accused of not trusting its Punjab team enough.

With Mann in the top slot, AAP is also hoping to prevent any erosion of its appeal among Jatt Sikhs. It got almost 30% of the votes from this dominant community in 2017, second only to the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD)’s 37%. The Congress’s decision to make Charanjit Singh Channi, who is from a Dalit community, the chief minister has already alienated the Jatt Sikhs from the party, who see the CM’s seat as its prerogative. AAP hopes to mop up these disgruntled votes. The political entry of the splinter farmer group the Sanyukt Samaj Morcha (SSM) led by the well-known farmer leader Balbir Singh Rajewal also threatens to eat into AAP’s Jatt Sikh votes and the party has already begun to warn the people “not to waste” their votes on outfits that don’t have a chance of winning.

In the game of who will be the chief ministerial face of the party, the contest in the Congress is far more tough and fraught with consequences. The party has no immediate intention of categorically indicating its choice and did not do so even in 2017, when Amarinder Singh led the charge but was never projected as the CM face before the election. This time, it has two bitter rivals in Charanjit Singh Channi and Navjot Singh Sidhu. The sitting chief minister’s identity has galvanised a huge numbers of Dalit voters towards the Congress when he was elevated. Balancing the all important Jatt Sikh base is Sidhu, the party’s state president who is virtually bulldozing the central leadership to announce him as the CM candidate.

In a not so subtle act, the party did indicate that it will prefer Channi if it comes to the crunch, tweeting a video from its official Twitter handle showing Channi as the ideal candidate. Besides his appeal to Dalit voters, Channi has emerged in the past three months as a balanced and mature leader, contrasting strongly with Sidhu’s mercurial ways.

So bitter is the fight between the two that Sidhu is publicly running down Channi, much to the dismay of the party cadres. Channi on the other hand has openly said that if Sidhu is not reigned in soon, the party may well lose the election. Sidhu, who left the BJP in 2016 to join the Congress, has had a rough time in the party during Amarinder Singh’s tenure as chief minister. He was axed from the cabinet and sulked at home for two years. This was a time when it was being speculated that he might join the AAP and be its CM face, but the party could not accommodate him. Sidhu got his revenge against Amarinder Singh when the Congress removed him as chief minister last September, but he was still not made the CM and the job was given to Channi.

The question that is up in the air now is whether Sidhu can jump ship again if his name is not announced soon. He knows that if the Congress does win or needs to tie up a post-poll alliance, Channi has left him far behind in the ratings game. Already, 29% of the people want Channi as the CM as against just 6% for Sidhu according to the C-Voter ratings released earlier this month. But unlike in the past, Sidhu’s options are limited. The AAP has a CM face in Mann and the Shiromani Akali Dal-BSP combine will not look beyond Sukhbir Singh Badal.

The BJP, which has allied with Amarinder Singh’s Punjab Lok Congress and the breakaway Sanyukt Akali Dal, has still not come clean on whether it will project Amarinder Singh as its CM candidate. It may not do so at all, because the party is coming in as a senior partner and will contest close to 70 seats. The BJP is also toying with the idea of projecting a Dalit Sikh as the chief ministerial candidate. In any case, the party is not a prominent player in Punjab politics but will also find it hard to accommodate Sidhu because his bête noire Amarinder Singh is already in its camp.

Those who know Sidhu well say that when pushed to the wall, the man with a burning ambition reacts in unexpected ways. He sees himself as the only reformist who can sweep corruption and mis-governance from Punjab. All the others are tainted in his eyes. This is why he does not enjoy much support from his own party leaders in Punjab, most of whom are shooting sharp missiles on Twitter and elsewhere at him. Now that AAP has taken the lead and cast its lot with Mann, the pressure on the Congress to declare its CM candidate will mount.