Congress’ instability in Punjab may boost AAP’s poll prospects: Report

The Congress’ move of tackling anti-incumbency, by following the model the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) used in Uttarakhand and Gujarat and changing the chief minister, ahead of Punjab elections next year may end up aiding the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), as per politicians and experts.

They added, “AAP stands to gain more from this than the Shiromani Akali Dal-Bahujan Samaj Party (SAD-BSP) combine. The BJP, which has been at the receiving end of the protesting farmers’ ire, is still struggling to get its act together in the state”, according to a report in the Hindustan Times. 

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AAP has been finding ways to cash in on the instability in Congress ever since it won 20 seats in the 2017 state polls, only to become the principal opposition party, Experts said, “The party is slowly gaining traction in large pockets of the state with its campaign theme and populist promises… it helps that the party has no baggage — unlike the Akalis who are not only facing a blowback from farmers, and are yet to overcome the backlash from the emotive sacrilege and police firing issues.”

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Prof Ashutosh Kumar, professor of political science, Panjab University, told Hindustan Times that the AAP will stand to gain from the instability in Congress in Punjab. 

However, AAP has its fair share of challenges to overcome as well. “They (AAP) have their own sets of problems, starting with the fact they have not been able to offer a chief ministerial face to people. Another issue is the party leadership’s attempts to run the state unit from Delhi which was hurt them in 2017 as well,” he added. In June, Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and AAP national convener announced that the party would have a Sikh CM candidate in the state

While the party searches for a face, it will have to manage the most popular AAP state leader, MP Bhagwant Mann. 

Raghav Chadha, co-incharge of AAP’s Punjab unit, said, “Congress party is on a suicide mission. It is destroying itself. The saddest thing is that in this constant fight over the throne in Punjab between Capt Singh, Navjot Singh Sidhu and a few others… the Congress government did not do any work. Now, if the Congress thinks that by merely changing the captain, they’d be able to save their Titanic-like sinking ship, then they are mistaken.”

“There has been so much corruption and lack of intent doing good work for the people of Punjab that now changing the captain of the ship will not help. The entire ship in Punjab needs to be changed and this is where AAP comes into play,” he said.