Shahkot (Jalandhar), May 19: In a setback for the Congress ahead of the May 28 bypoll, former Home Minister and senior leader Brij Bhupinder Lalli on Friday joined the SAD in the presence of party chief Sukhbir Badal at Kang Khurd village.
Lalli was among the five Congress ticket aspirants. Having served the party for nearly 40 years, Lalli alleged that he took the decision when his requests to CM Capt Amarinder Singh regarding “undue interference” of former minister Rana Gurjit Singh in other constituencies failed to evoke any response.
Lalli said: “Even though Capt Amarinder is related to me, he still did not give me time to discuss the issue. With a heavy heart, I am leaving the party at a time when it is in power.” He lauded the works of deceased minister Ajit Singh Kohar in his last five tenures.
Lalli had joined the Congress in 1977 and was named Punjab Youth Congress general secretary the next year. He won the state Assembly elections from Lohian in 1992 and was inducted into the Cabinet in 1996. Lalli claims to have had a good support base in the area as he got inducted nearly 250 panchayat secretaries from the constituency when he was the Rural Development Minister.
Rana Gurjit termed the desertion “a good riddance for the party”, calling Lalli a “non-entity” in Shahkot.
Keeping in mind the fact that Shahkot has nearly 30,000 Valmiki voters, Sukhbir took Sufi singer Hans Raj Hans to all events on the first day of his campaign. Hans gave youths at the rallies a chance to click selfies with him. Hans had quit the SAD in 2014 after being denied ticket for the Lok Sabha polls.
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