Amritsar: Ahead of the announcement of the chief minister face for the Punjab Assembly polls, Congress’s state unit chief Navjot Singh Sidhu took a subtle swipe at the Gandhis. He said ‘people at the top’ want a weak chief minister.
“People at the top want a weak chief minister who can dance to their tune,” Navjyot Singh Sidhu told his supporters here Friday. However, he did not make it clear whether he was referring to the Congress central leadership or anybody else.
When contacted, Sidhu’s media advisor said that the leader was actually referring to the government at the Centre.
Sidhu’s remark came at a time when Congress leader Rahul Gandhi is likely to announce the name of his party’s chief ministerial candidate for the Punjab polls, Sunday in Ludhiana.
For the last several weeks, both Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and Sidhu have directly or indirectly made a case for themselves to be declared as the party’s nominee for the top post.
Addressing his supporters and workers after returning from Mata Vaishno Devi shrine in Jammu and Kashmir, Sidhu targeted SAD leader Bikram Singh Majithia, who is fighting against the Congress leader from Amritsar East.
Sidhu lashed out at the SAD for its alleged misrule and ‘looting’ the state besides ‘patronising criminals’. They established a ‘goonda raj’, he alleged.
Sidhu also took on AAP national convenor Arvind Kejriwal. He asked whether he was giving Rs 1,000 per month to every woman above 18 years of age in the national capital, a promise the Delhi CM made in Punjab. “What is his stand on the SYL. He must clarify,” said Sidhu of the Sutlej-Yamuna link canal.
Attacking the Delhi CM, Sidhu said Kejriwal he wants to run through remote control from Delhi. “I have to say one thing that if a new Punjab has to be made, it is in the hands of the chief minister,” said Sidhu. “You have to choose the CM this time. If you make an honest person sit at the top, then honesty will percolate down below,” Sidhu asserted.