Friends have turned foes, it seems! For everything that has gone wrong during the recently-concluded parliamentary polls, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is blaming its ally, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD).
On a defensive, the Akali Dal is trying to pull itself out of the situation by dubbing all decisions as “collective”, though at the same time, admitting that its decision on property tax, and drug menace in the State resulted in the combine’s “not-so-good” performance.
As the two coalition partners are conducting their separate brainstorming session to evaluate their performance and the reasons that led to the SAD-BJP combine’s defeat on seven seats out the total 13 in Punjab, the two have now decided to go into damage-control mode, after a brief blame-game. On the day two of its lok Sabha election appraisal process, the SAD chief and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal announced that the property tax would not be imposed as per collector rate. This is not all! He also declared that “special budget” would be allocated for drug de-addiction.
On the other hand, the saffron brigade has vowed to “intensely” raise the issues that actually concern the common people, besides launching an anti-drug campaign and ensuring that guilty, irrespective of their position and status, be punished.
Akali Dal is currently holding its three-day district-wise meetings with senior party leaders including old office bearers of the district units, MlAs, former MlAs, MPs, SGPC members and other senior leaders to analyze party’s performance during 2014 general elections.During the deliberations on the first two days of the ongoing post poll analysis, the SAD leaders pointed out the growing drug menace in the state, alleged political patronage to the drug trade, high prices and unavailability of sand and gravel, illegal sand mining, liquor trade, among others as the reasons that led to its failure to wrest seven seats.
Akali leaders maintained that there was dire need to check the growing drug menace that has took large proportions in the state, and the issue that was raised by all the political parties against the ruling combine during this election. They stressed to dealt strictly with the same, and punish the guilty.
BJP, besides the issues listed by the SAD for poll debacle, has pointed the imposition of taxes, including property tax, e-trip system, and deteriorating law and order in the state, that led to lot of resentment among the people, resulting in its loss of seven seats, despite strong Modi wave across the country.
BJP state president Kamal Sharma on Wednesday held meeting with the state office bearers, district presidents, heads of party’s different morchas and wings to review party’s performance in the elections.
The party, holding the SAD responsible for its reason defeat in Amritsar constituency, maintained that the main reason was the differences within the party. Notably, former Amritsar MP Navjot Singh Sidhu stayed away from the campaigning for his political guru and combine’s candidate Arun Jaitley against former Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh.
His MlA wife Dr Navjot Kaur Sidhu too supported his husband and raised various issues before elections that proved costly for the combine.
“Drug menace has emerged as the major issue this election and the Chief Minister has initiated some steps tomorrow. Besides, there was resentment among the people over property tax, that Chief Minister has promised to review which is a welcome step,” Punjab party unit chief Kamal Sharma told The Pioneer.
He said that the party would launch an anti-drug campaign as “we have asked all the workers to work hard against drug racket in the state. We have also appealed the Punjab government to take strict action against the persons involved in drug racket”.
At the same time, Sharma made it clear that there was “no question of parting ways” with its age-old ally. “Such things happen, and we improve after criticizing and evaluating our performance,” he said.
A senior SAD leader, on the other hand, maintained that BJP leaders should maintain dignity of the coalition by not resorting to indulge in a blame-game in public. “We two have to sit together and evaluate what went wrong where. Blaming each other in public is not going to resolve anything,” he said, requesting anonymity.
Despite improving its tally by one seat as compared to 2009 polls coupled with increase in its vote share by almost one per cent, the party’s stalwart Arun Jaitley’s defeat in Amritsar has proved to be a major embarrassment, not only for the BJP, but also for the SAD that persuaded the Rajya Sabha member to contest his first ever lok Sabha election ensuring him an easy win.
With BJP’s two seats, the alliance managed to bag six seat in all with SAD’s share of four seats. Congress party could win only three seats, down from eight in 2009, while the remaining four was secured by new-entrant Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)—the party which has drawn blank across the country.