JP Nadda, the BJP’s president, declared on Monday that his party and its partners have reached a seat-sharing agreement for the state elections on February 20.
The BJP revealed the seat-sharing arrangement with its two partners, the Punjab Lok Congress led by former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh and Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa’s Shiromani Akali Dal (Sanyukt), on Monday, ahead of the key Punjab elections next month
In the 117-member Assembly, the saffron party will contest for 65 seats, the Punjab Lok Congress for 37, and the Shiromani Akali Dal (Sanyukt) for the remaining 15 seats.
BJP president JP Nadda with Union home minister Amit Shah, Captain Amarinder Singh and Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa on Monday. (Photo: Twitter)Their campaign will be focused on “stability, security, and change to ensure the future of Punjab and its people,” according to the BJP.
Calling it a “Grand Alliance”, BJP president JP Nadda said in New Delhi that they would fight not just for “a change of regime but to keep the future generation safe, and for the stability of Punjab”. Accompanied by Amarinder and Dhindsa at the press meet, Nadda said Punjab is in “a deep economic crisis” and needs a “double engine government to push it on the path to development”.
Leaders of BJP-Led alliance in Punjab jointly address a press conference at party headquarters in New Delhi. https://t.co/uXc6yapnyh
— BJP (@BJP4India) January 24, 2022
“Punjab is a border state, for the security of the country, it is necessary to have a stable and strong government in Punjab. We know how Pakistan’s actions have been for our country. We have seen there that there are attempts to smuggle drugs and weapons,” Nadda said. “It is always the intention of the anti-national forces that there should be activity through Punjab in this derailing.”
Nadda added that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had constituted an SIT to probe the 1984 Riots and the accused are in jail today. “We will abolish ‘Mafia Raj’ in Punjab,” he said.
According to Dhindsa, his party had decided to join the BJP to “stop the mafia” in Punjab, while Amarinder said he had come together with the saffron party for the “sake of stability of the country and also the security of the nation and the state”.
“He was inefficient, incompetent, and useless,” the Captain stated of Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu.
The Congress, led by Amarinder Singh, won 77 of the 117 Assembly seats in the 2017 Punjab elections.