Sidhu concedes defeat in Amritsar East before counting ends, tweets congratulations to AAP

Battle for Amritsar East seat was a high-profile one owing to prominent candidates. However, most pre-poll conversations about the seat had centred around Sidhu and SAD's Bikram Majithia.

File photo of Navjot Singh Sidhu | PTI

New Delhi: Congress Punjab President Navjot Singh Sidhu conceded defeat in his Amritsar East seat even before counting completed Thursday. Sidhu is the sitting MLA from Amritsar East.

Taking to Twitter, Sidhu said that he humbly accepts the mandate of the people of Punjab and congratulated the Aam Aadmi Party which looks set to form government for the first time in the state.

“The voice of the people is the voice of God …. Humbly accept the mandate of the people of Punjab …. Congratulations to Aap !!! (sic)”, wrote Sidhu.

The voice of the people is the voice of God …. Humbly accept the mandate of the people of Punjab …. Congratulations to Aap !!!

— Navjot Singh Sidhu (@sherryontopp) March 10, 2022

Sidhu’s tweet came after seven rounds of counting in the seat, which saw him trailing behind the AAP’s Jeevan Jyot Kaur by about five thousand votes.

While Kaur had secured 25,536 votes — after eight rounds of counting — Sidhu had received 20,334 votes, according to data available on the EC website. The Shiromani Aklai Dal’s Bikram Majithia had secured 16,154 votes. The fourth high-profile candidate from the seat was Jagmohan Singh Raju of BJP, a former IAS officer from the Tamil Nadu cadre, who had received 3,652 votes after eight rounds of counting.

The battle for the Amritsar East seat was a high-profile one owing to the high-profile candidates contesting for the seat. However, most pre-poll conversations about the seat had centred around Sidhu and his bete-noir, Majithia.

The battle for Amritsar East

Since the seat was carved out after a delimitation exercise in 2012, the Amritsar East Seat has shown support for Sidhu twice — in 2012, when his wife Navjyot Kaur Sidhu contested and won from here on a BJP ticket, and in 2017 when he himself fought for the Congress.

Back then, Sidhu had helped the Congress win 10 of 11 assembly seats in the Amritsar district, though it had been considered a bastion of the Badal family leading SAD.

However, this time the electoral battle for the seat became more high-pitched as SAD President Sukhbir Singh Badal’s brother-in-law, Bikram Majithia, accepted Sidhu’s challenge to contest from Amritsar East. Majithia, prodded by party patriarch Parkash Singh Badal, left his traditional Majitha seat to his wife Ganieve Kaur,  to take on Sidhu in his home turf.

Sidhu has in recent times campaigned aggressively for the arrest of Majithia, once considered to be his close friend, for his alleged involvement in a drug racket in Punjab. The issue also became an electoral talking point for the Congress.

Now, Sidhu’s personal electoral fate in the polls and the Congress’ result in the Amritsar district, may play a role in determining his future in the party.

Meanwhile, first-time assembly election contestant Jeevan Jyot Kaur is a social activist, popularly nicknamed ‘Padwoman of Punjab’, for running a programme under which women inmates were provided sanitary napkins in jails across Punjab. She is also founder of the Sri Hemkunt Education (SHE) Society, which works with the poor and underprivileged in society.