Chandigarh, February 17:
Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Wednesday hailed the Congress party’s spectacular victory in the state municipal polls as not just a validation of his government’s development-oriented policies and programmes but also a total rejection of the anti-people actions of the major opposition parties, namely SAD, AAP and BJP.
Congratulating Punjab Congress president Sunil Jakhar, as well as all MLAs, members and workers of the party, for the sweeping victory in the civic polls, the results of which were declared today, the Chief Minister said the people of the state had clearly and unequivocally denounced the divisive, undemocratic, unconstitutional and regressive agendas of the three parties. He thanked and congratulated the people for defeating the negative and vicious forces that are out to ruin Punjab and its future.
The first major polls to be held in Punjab since the enactment of the draconian Farm Laws had also underscored people’s angst with the BJP, which was responsible for the anti-farmer legislation with the active support of its former ally, the SAD, and the collusion of ruling AAP in Delhi, Captain Amarinder noted. All these parties had shamelessly trampled the rights of the farmers, with the clear aim of destroying Punjab, he said, adding that the SAD’s and AAP’s subsequent theatrics and crocodile tears for the farmers had failed to befool the voters, who had seen through the political gimmickry of these parties.
With the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) not even a close second to the Congress and trailing even independent candidates in some wards, the pro-governance and pro-progress verdict of the urban voters of Punjab was a clear endorsement of their negation of their loathsome political ideologies, said the Chief Minister. It was a powerful message to these parties to keep out of Punjab, which was not ready to either forgive or forget the deceit and the treachery to which the people of the state had been subjected by them, he added.
In the final count, the Congress had won 1199 of the 1815 wards (municipal councils) and 281 of the 350 municipal corporation seats, with SAD trailing at 289 and 33, BJP at 38 and 20, and AAP at 57 and nine, while the remaining went largely to independents and BSP (K) and CPI winning in 13 and 12 wards respectively. The swing in favour of the Congress in comparison with the 2015 municipal corporation elections in Bathinda, Hoshiarpur, Moga and Pathankot districts is manifest in the fact that from 11 seats back then, the party’s tally has improved to a whopping 149 now. Similarly, in the wards, from 356 in 2015, the Congress score now has gone up to 1480.
“With these results, all these parties have got a foretaste of things to come in the Assembly elections, due just a year from now,” said Captain Amarinder. The drumming that SAD, BJP and AAP have received in these civic polls is just the tip of the iceberg, and all three are set to be wiped out of Punjab’s political arena, and subsequently from the nation’s political landscape, in the months ahead, he added.
