Punjab Congress chief Capt Amarinder Singh on Saturday accused Badals of indulging in politics of ‘distraction’ to divert public attention from the ‘widespread rebellion’ in their own party by unleashing a ‘disinformation’ campaign against the Congress.
Dismissing Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal's ‘Congress tug of war’ remark, he said the Akali leadership should look at putting their own house in order before raking up non-existent differences within the Congress.
Amarinder also rejected Badal's allegation that the Congress would withdraw all subsidies and concessions in the state on coming to power as ‘baseless rhetoric’ aimed at covering up his party’s own ‘failures’. Yesterday, Badal had said Congress was a ‘divided house’ which was hardly a match for Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), while taking a jibe on the alleged ongoing ‘tug of war’ among the state Congress leadership over ticket allocation.
Having announced names of candidates on only 85 seats in more than a month and faced with ‘large-scale’ revolt within the party from ‘disgruntled aspirants’ who had been denied tickets, the SAD was struggling to hold itself together, Amarinder said.
The SAD was ‘coming down like a pack of cards’ which they were unable to put back together even by resorting to all kinds of ‘gimmicks and violation of norms’, he further said.
Pointing out that the first SAD's list of 69 candidates was announced on November 16, Amarinder said not a single list declared thereafter by the party had more than nine names, with the last list, released on Friday, containing only three names.
This, said Amarinder, clearly reflected the extent of "discontent" prevailing in the Badal camp, which was striving desperately to remain in the fight for the Assembly polls.