AAP's Punjab CM face Bhagwant Mann to contest from Dhuri
Darpan News Desk The Canadian Press, 20 Jan, 2022 11:55 AM
Chandigarh, Jan 20 (IANS) Two-time Member of Parliament and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief ministerial candidate Bhagwant Mann will be contesting from Dhuri in the February 20 polls in Punjab.
The announcement was made by state affairs co in-charge Raghav Chadha in Mohali on Thursday.
"Mann is a pan-Punjab leader and will campaign for party candidates across the state. We are the only party to go into the polls with a CM's face," Chadha told reporters. He also said Mann and Arvind Kejriwal form a formidable team.
Mann, 48, is pitted against Congress sitting legislator Dalvir Singh Goldy where former Sangrur MLA Parkash Chand Garg is in the fray as the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) candidate.
The Sanyukt Samaj Morcha, an outfit floated by 19 farm organisations, has fielded former sarpanch Sarabjit Singh Alal as its candidate.
In 2017 Assembly polls, Goldy defeated AAP's Jasvir Singh Jassi Sekhon by a slender margin of 2,811 votes.
The Dhuri Assembly constituency falls in the Sangrur parliamentary seat that commedia-turned-politician Mann, 48, is representing.
The AAP has so far named candidates on 112 of the 117 Assembly seats.
In the 2017 assembly polls, the Congress won a whopping 77 seats in the 117-member House, while SAD-BJP combine could win only 18 seats. AAP emerged as the second-largest party with 20 seats.
Acceding to the major demand of the PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Channi said the foundation stone of a convention centre for PITEX spread over 10 acres would be laid within a week to enable the organisation to carry out diverse range of activities to promote trade and industry in the region in a big way.
Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Friday informed the Lok Sabha that Punjab had reported four deaths due to shortage of Oxygen during the second wave of Covid-19 pandemic.
Welcoming the leaders in the party, Shekhawat said that the BJP will be strengthened in Punjab. "They have faith in Prime Minister Narendra Modi and they will strengthen the organisation in the state. BJP is moving ahead in Punjab and will create a new history," he said, noting all the new joinees are prominent names in their respective fields.
Sharing details, Director General of Police (DGP) Punjab Iqbal Preet Singh Sahota said keeping in view the recent recoveries of RDX, hand grenades and pistols from the border district, strong barricading has been done.
The BJP, which is likely to contest the Punjab assembly polls on its own for the first time after its ally Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) walked away, will be banking on leaders from the opposition parties and prominent personalities to make its electoral presence felt in the state. In the last assembly polls in 2017, the BJP had won only three out of the 23 seats it contested.
Slamming Amarinder Singh for his "myopic" mindset towards the poor, Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi said on Friday that the former CM targeted him because he had raised issues of the common man.
