Bhagwant Mann is one of those political leaders who can be sarcastic, scornful and serious at the same time. The 48-year-old Sangrur MP, and now the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) CM candidate, was named the party’s chief ministerial face after more than 93 per cent of respondents voted for him in a phone line survey.

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Mann, a college dropout, turned out to be one of India’s popular standup comedians. He later turned out to be a crowd-pulling leader of Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party in Punjab.

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The AAP’s CM candidate is nothing new to controversies. He has often been called an alcoholic and his drinking habit has earned him the sobriquet “Pegwant Mann”. However, it turned out that he was just a social drinker.

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He has even been accused of entering Parliament drunk. It was first mentioned in 2015 by former AAP leader Yogendra Yadav, who alleged that Mann attended Parliament sessions drunk. In January 2019, with his mother Harpal Kaur on his side, Mann claimed to have given up alcohol and turned sober.

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In February 2017, Prime Minister Narendra Modi took a dig at Bhagwant Mann that left Lok Sabha members in laughter. Referring to an old Charvaka poem, PM Modi said that instead of asking people to drink “ghee (clarified butter)”, Mann would “ask them to drink something else”.

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The Election Commission of India rescheduled Punjab’s assembly elections to February 20, 2022. The polls were earlier set for February 14 but were moved further in light of Guru Ravidas Jayanti. The results will be announced on March 10.