Chandigarh: The ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Punjab got a shot in the arm Saturday, having clinched a remarkable victory in the Jalandhar West assembly bypoll.
Mohinder Bhagat of the AAP won the seat with a resounding margin of over 37,325 votes while BJP’s Sheetal Angural came in second followed by Surinder Kaur of the Congress in third position.
For the AAP, retaining Jalandhar West came as a much-needed victory following its abysmal performance in the Lok Sabha elections. The AAP won only three of 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab while the Congress won seven, including the Jalandhar seat.
AAP’s poor performance in the Lok Sabha polls a little over two years after storming to power in the state by winning 92 seats in the 117-member House had led to concerns within the party’s high command over Bhagwant Mann’s performance as chief minister.
The victory Saturday is also vindication of Mann who had taken upon himself to win this bypoll while leading from the front. He even set up camp in Jalandhar to campaign for the AAP candidate and had been living in a rented accommodation there for the past 20 days.
Mann, it is learnt, is expecting that the bypoll result will quell voices of discontentment among AAP MLAs regarding the chief minister.
Talks of more than two-and-a-half dozen MLAs gunning for a new chief minister have been doing the rounds in Punjab’s power corridors.
There is also talk of growing resentment among party workers against Mann centralising power since in addition to being chief minister, he is also the party’s top functionary in the state.
Sources in the Punjab AAP told ThePrint that several MLAs were meeting the party’s central leadership including Raghav Chadha and Sandeep Pathak almost on a regular basis with their list of complaints against Mann.
Aware of the fact that his political career might depend on these bypolls, the chief minister pulled out all the stops. Apart from the opening of a temporary office and grievance cell in Jalandhar, nearly the entire cabinet and Mann’s close family members campaigned intensively in the constituency. Mann even promised he would spend two days a week in Jalandhar to ensure Punjab’s Majha and Doaba regions are not ignored.
Reacting to the victory, Mann wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that the huge margin of victory of the AAP candidate reflected the satisfaction among Punjabis over his government’s performance. “As promised during the elections we will make Jalandhar West the best,” wrote Mann.
ਵਿਧਾਨ ਸਭਾ ਹਲਕਾ ਜਲੰਧਰ ਪੱਛਮੀ ਦੀ ਜ਼ਿਮਨੀ ਚੋਣ ਵਿੱਚ ਆਮ ਆਦਮੀ ਪਾਰਟੀ ਦੀ ਸ਼ਾਨਦਾਰ ਜਿੱਤ ਦੀ ਸਭ ਨੂੰ ਬਹੁਤ ਬਹੁਤ ਵਧਾਈ… ਵੱਡੀ ਲੀਡ ਨਾਲ ਮਿਲੀ ਜਿੱਤ ਇਹ ਦਰਸਾਉਂਦੀ ਹੈ ਕਿ ਪੰਜਾਬ ਭਰ ਦੇ ਲੋਕ ਸਾਡੀ ਸਰਕਾਰ ਦੇ ਕੰਮਾਂ ਤੋਂ ਬੇਹੱਦ ਖੁੱਸ਼ ਹਨ…ਜ਼ਿਮਨੀ ਚੋਣ ਦੌਰਾਨ ਕੀਤੇ ਵਾਅਦੇ ਅਨੁਸਾਰ ਜਲੰਧਰ ਵੈਸਟ ਨੂੰ ਵੀ ਅਸੀਂ ਬੈਸਟ…
— Bhagwant Mann (@BhagwantMann) July 13, 2024
With the Jalandhar West bypoll victory under his belt Mann is expected to rejig his cabinet with renewed confidence. The reshuffle has been due since the declaration of general election results. A seat in the cabinet was vacated following the victory of minister Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer from Sangrur Lok Sabha seat. Besides filling that vacancy, Mann is also expected to shift the ministers who contested the Lok Sabha seats and lost.
Talking to media persons following the bypoll result AAP national general secretary (organisation) Sandeep Pathak said it showed that the people of Punjab continue to support the AAP’s governance model and that of Arvind Kejriwal and Bhagwant Mann.
He added that the outcome also carried another message — the people are opposed to those who are voted to power but abandon the party in search of greener pastures. The BJP needs to learn a lesson that they should quit politics of “hooliganism” which will not bear results in the long run, he said.
The Jalandhar West bypoll was necessitated following Angural’s resignation as the sitting AAP MLA after he joined the BJP ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. Though Angural tried to return to the AAP after 4 June, the Speaker accepted his resignation and the seat was deemed vacated.
While AAP’s Mohinder Bhagat secured 55,246 votes in the bypoll, Anugral was a distant second with 17,921 votes, followed by Congress’s Surinder Kaur with 16,757 votes. Surjit Kaur of the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), who withdrew from the battle, secured 1,242 votes and Binder Kumar Lakha of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) a meagre 734 votes in the bypoll.
The son of former state minister and BJP veteran Chunni Lal Bhagat, Mohinder Bhagat shifted to AAP from the BJP in April last year.
He had unsuccessfully contested from Jalandhar West assembly seat in 2017 and 2022.
The outcome of the bypoll can be seen as a major setback for the Congress which was buoyed by the Lok Sabha elections results. Former chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi who won the Jalandhar seat just a month ago actively campaigned for the Congress candidate in the bypoll.
However, despite its efforts the party suffered a humiliating defeat, which also signals a steep climb ahead of it if it wishes to stage a comeback in the 2027 assembly elections.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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