The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are yet to reach a consensus on the issue of resolving their differences.
Over a month has lapsed since it was decided to “immediately” constitute a six-member ‘fact-finding’ committee by the state leaders of both the parties, comprising three members each, for ironing out the differences of opinion on various issues between the two parties. But, they are yet to reach an agreement on the same.
Even as the disputes between the two coalition partners are widening with BJP leaders raising banner of revolt against their own Government, and SAD leaders hitting back at them while reminding them of “coalition dharma”, the SAD has put the issue on the backburner.
Attribute it to the burning controversy over creation of separate Shiromani Gurudwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) for Haryana, or the forthcoming by-elections, or Deputy Chief Minister and SAD president Sukhbir Badal’s unavailability, the divide between SAD and BJP is widening.
“We will soon form the committee…it could not be constituted till now as earlier Sukhbir Badal was abroad, and later this issue of HSGPC was raised….it followed the announcement of byelections,” Punjab BJP president Kamal Sharma told The Pioneer.
The Akali Dal, along with the SGPC, Akal Takht, Delhi Gurudwara Committee, among others, is spearheading the campaign against the Haryana Government over the formation of HSGPC.
It has also been approaching the Centre meeting the Prime Minister, Union Ministers to revoke the Haryana Government’s decision. On the other hand, the state will witnessed by-polls for the two assembly segments of Patiala and Talwandi Sabo on August 21. As per coalition arrangement, the SAD has fielded its candidates on both the seats.
Hoping that the Committee would be formed before bypolls or the HSGPC issue settled down, Sharma said: “We are hopeful that Committee would be formed in the coming few days…and it won’t take time till byelection.”
At the time of announcing the formation of six-member fact-finding committee, Punjab BJP party affairs in-charge Shanta Kumar had stated that the Committee would “review the issues raised by the BJP, give its recommendations, and the government will then implement the same….all this exercise — review, decision, and implementation — has to be completed within three months”.
Already over a month has gone by, and the two ruling partners have failed to reach on consensus over the “size” of the Committee. As the Akali Dal is pressing for having eight members in the Committee, the BJP is in favour of “smaller committee”.
“SAD was suggesting to have eight-member committee, four members from each side, but we want the smaller committee and it should be formed at the earliest,” said Sharma.
The Committee was formed after the BJP blamed its ally, SAD, for the coalition’s poor performance in 2014 General elections in Punjab despite having their own government in the State, anti-Congress wave and Modi-tsunami sweeping across the entire country.
The combine’s defeat on seven seats out the total 13 in Punjab ensued in a blame-game with the BJP pointing out SAD’s “wrong decisions” on imposing taxes including property tax and taxes on trading community, high prices of sand and gravel besides its unavailability, deteriorating law and order situation, and above all, the growing drug menace.
With the formation of Committee in abeyance, the “dissatisfied” BJP leaders continued to raise their voice against their own government. The latest “rebel” is the local Bodies Minister Anil Joshi who declared to protest against the government is ‘advance tax on stock’ was not withdrawn. Joshi was later joined by some more BJP ministers, and party MlAs that eventually resulted in withdrawal of the tax. In the wake of such “outbursts”, Sharma has recently met the Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal urging him to form the committee at the earliest, which he assured.
Nevertheless, to resolve the issues or points of differences between the two at the state and grass root levels, the alliance partners had set up the joint coordination panels at the state and district levels, respectively—but so far their existence remained shrouded under a thick blanket of obscurity. BJP, at the same time, has called for reviving the same panels to fine-tune the relations between the two.
The state-level committee comprised SAD’s Daljeet Singh Cheema and BJP’s
Tikshan Sud. “These panels exist…we formed it before elections….but there is a dire need to make them more functional,” said Kamal Sharma.