Poll announcement sparks flurry of activity in Amritsar
Neeraj Bagga
Amritsar, March 16
The release of the Lok Sabha poll schedule by the Election Commission of India has kicked off a flurry of political activity in the Amritsar Lok Sabha seat consisting of nine Assembly segments, having 15,87,436 voters. Though the Jandiala Guru and Baba Bakala segments fall in Amritsar, these are clubbed under adjoining the Khadoor Sahib Lok Sabha seat.
Among all political parties in the fray, the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) became the first to announce its candidate for the seat. It fielded Punjab Minister of NRI Affairs Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal from the seat two days ago. On the other hand, the Congress, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are likely to announce their candidates in the next couple of days. Sources said the Congress was likely to re-nominate its incumbent MP Gurjeet Singh Aujla.
In case of the SAD and BJP, if their alliance does not work then both the parties will field their separate candidates. For the Akali Dal, names of its two former Cabinet ministers Bikram Singh Majithia and Anil Joshi are doing the rounds.
Former Indian Ambassador to the US Taranjit Singh Sandhu, who has been camping in the city, is likely to be fielded by the BJP, said the sources.
In the last 20 Lok Sabha elections, including byelections, for the Amritsar seat, the Congress won the seat for a maximum 13 times. Its late leader RL Bhatia won for maximum six times. Navjot Singh Sidhu, a joint candidate of the SAD-BJP alliance, ended the electoral journey of Bhatia by defeating him in the 2004 election. He won the seat thrice for the alliance. Then Congress leader Capt Amarinder Singh had brought back the seat in favour of his party by defeating BJP stalwart late Arun Jaitley in the 2014 election. After him, Aujla won the seat twice for the Congress.
Starting from Gurmukh Singh Musafir, who won the seat thrice in 1952, 1957 and 1962, and then RL Bhatia, the Amritsar Lok Sabha seat had traditionally been a Congress bastion.
