Two weeks after his homecoming in the Congress party, the former Leader of the Opposition in Punjab Vidhan Sabha and founder-president of the Punjab Ekta Party Sukhpal Singh Khaira on Thursday formally merged his two-year-old political outfit with the ruling Congress.
Elected legislator on the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) ticket from Bholath, Khaira met the Congress’ former national president Rahul
Gandhi, along with AAP’s two other “rebel” MLAs — Jagdev Singh (Maur) and Pirmal Singh (Bhadaur) — at Gandhi’s Delhi residence. The state party affairs in-charge Harish Rawat, and general secretary
Randeep Singh Surjewala were also present.
While describing his decision to join AAP as “biggest mistake”, Khaira claimed that more legislators and leaders from the Aam Aadmi Party are expected to join the Congress soon.
Khaira’s Delhi visit and meeting with Rahul Gandhi came at a time when the Congress high command is struggling to defuse the prevailing crisis within the Punjab party unit.
The meeting came just days before the interim president Soni Gandhi had invited Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh, firebrand leader Navjot Singh Sidhu, besides other senior leaders in Delhi on June 20 to work out a compromise and end the factionalism.
The meeting with Rahul Gandhi, who has been closely monitoring the prevailing situation in Punjab party unit, has put a final stamp of approval on the induction of three AAP MLAs in the Congress. They are yet to be formally inducted into the party.
On June 3, a day before Capt Amarinder was to meet the three-member panel constituted to resolve the factionalism, the Chief Minister had re-inducted Khaira even before a formal go-ahead from the central leadership.
Khaira had left the Congress and joined AAP in 2015 and won from the Bholath seat on AAP ticket in 2017. After differences with the AAP leadership, especially party supremo Arvind Kejriwal, Khaira went on to float his own political outfit in January 2019, ahead of parliamentary polls.
Firebrand Khaira, once the hard critique of Capt Amarinder, has been two time MLA; while the other two MLAs are the first-timers.
All three have submitted their resignations as the members of the state legislative Assembly to the Punjab Vidhan Sabha — on which the Speaker Rana KP Singh is expected to take a call.