Chandigarh, November 2
After sharing cold vibes for weeks, efforts seem to be on track to bring back political bonhomie between the SAD and the BJP, the two alliance partners. The initiative has been taken by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal.

During his Delhi visit yesterday, Badal, SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal and Union Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal met Arun Jaitley and the BJP chief Amit Shah.

A few hours after the meeting, Jaitley said the SAD-BJP alliance was on firm footing and both parties would jointly contest the next elections in Delhi and Punjab. Jaitley also made it a point to be present at a function organised by the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee in Delhi. SAD's top leadership was present at the function. The tussle between the alliance partners assumed a serious dimension following former Amritsar MP Navjot Singh Sidhu's scathing attack on the SAD leadership while campaigning for the BJP in Haryana. The Badals may have broached the SAD's souring relations with the BJP with Jaitley and Amit Shah at the meeting.

This can be gauged from the statements given by the Badals today. In Gurdaspur, Sukhbir Badal has been quoted as saying: "We (SAD-BJP) are working together. Our alliance and relations are indivisible…The SAD-BJP would rule the state for the next three decades." Speaking elsewhere, Parkash Singh Badal also talked about the SAD-BJP alliance on similar lines.

Before yesterday's meeting, the SAD leaders had stopped referring to the BJP at functions. They had to try hard to wriggle out of the searching questions asked about the "differences" between the alliance partners.

The reported cold shouldering of the senior Badal at Haryana CM's swearing-in ceremony and absence of Sukhbir Badal from the function added credence to the story that all was not well between the two allies.

With the BJP on ascendance in the country and Punjab facing a fiscal crisis, the SAD leadership wants to maintain good relationship its ally.