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Bypoll battle: Will Chabbewal see ‘son-rise’ against battle-ready turncoats
The Chabbewal assembly by-election features a contest among candidates with past party switches, creating voter confusion and a battle for support.
With the son of a turncoat MP pitted against two candidates who too switched sides just before the candidature was to be announced, the Chabbewal assembly constituency is poised for an interesting contest. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has fielded Ishank Kumar, son of sitting Hoshiarpur MP Raj Kumar Chabbewal who left the Congress to contest the Lok Sabha elections for AAP in June this year. Ishank has been associated with his father’s political campaigns.
The BJP has fielded Sohan Singh Thandal, a former Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) leader who represented this constituency from 1997 to 2017, while the Congress has picked Ranjit Kumar who had contested the previous Lok Sabha polls as a Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) candidate.
The Chabbewal by-election was necessitated after Raj Kumar, then a Congress MLA, resigned to contest the Lok Sabha poll from Hoshiarpur for AAP. Earlier known as Mahilpur, this reserved constituency was reshaped and renamed in the delimitation process by shuffling Mahilpur, Garhshankar and Hoshiarpur segments.
Confusion prevails
Leaders’ defection has caused confusion as well as dejection among workers of different parties who are finding it hard to make out which way to go. Sympathisers of the BSP and the SAD are perplexed as the parties haven’t fielded candidates. BSP’s newly appointed state president Avtar Singh Karimpuri, who won this seat in 1992, said the decision to stay away from the by-election was taken before he took the reins. He said the party would not like to strengthen its “opponents” by asking its cadres to vote in a particular way.
SAD’s vote bank is also likely to go in different directions. BJP’s Thandal has managed to mollify some of his loyalists but there are a few who have vowed to vote against him as they believe he has “backstabbed the party in its difficult phase”. Congress workers believe that the party’s move to choose a leader from the BSP while ignoring its own men is likely to affect the voting pattern.
AAP banks on Raj Kumar’s clout
AAP’s Ishank Kumar’s election campaign hinges on personal connections of Raj Kumar and the works initiated or executed by him in the last 10 years. Raj Kumar claims in public meetings that ₹70 crore has landed for projects in the constituency and ₹2 crore given for concretisation of kutcha houses.
Chief minister Bhagwant Mann has already addressed three meetings in the constituency. Knowing that his prestige is at stake, Raj Kumar is pulling out all the stops during canvassing for his son and accompanies him almost in every public meeting. Ishank has been promising better roads, bridges, community centres, gymnasiums besides a polytechnic college.
“You have better chances of securing amenities if the MP and the MLA is from the ruling state party. My father and I will work together to address your needs. Besides, the CM has promised to clear all the projects I recommend,” he tells residents during meetings.
He also highlights the state government’s 300 unit free electricity to every household.
Congress highlights ‘unfulfilled’ promises
Congress nominee Ranjit Kumar, who got less time to make public contact, draws attention to the unfulfilled promises of the AAP government during his rallies and slams it for deteriorating law and order situation.
While Congress leaders are busy putting the house in order which was left in shambles with Raj Kumar’s exit, Ranjit Kumar is using his personal influence to draw the BSP vote bank. Being the president of the district bar association, he is getting support from a section of the lawyer community.
“Congress’ concerns are deeply aligned with the welfare of common people. It is vocal about caste census and other issues concerning the scheduled castes. It has the will and the capacity to deliver,” he says , justifying his switch to the grand old party.
The party also faced revolt. An old worker and ticket aspirant, Kulwinder Singh Rasoolpur, who left the Congress, has been aggressively working for AAP. Some workers, miffed with the party’s choice, are said to have been keeping low. At the same time, constituency in-charge Rana Gurjit Singh and former minister Sunder Sham Arora are campaigning aggressively for Ranjit Kumar.
BJP’s Thandal underlines ‘nepotism’
The move of Sohan Singh Thandal to leave the SAD for the BJP appears to have not gone down well with members of both parties. A few leaders of the saffron party point out that though BJP leaders are campaigning for him, the drive lacks enthusiasm. “Resentment is simmering among local leaders who believe they could have been a better candidate,” say workers, wishing not to be named.
The setbacks since 2017 have not disheartened Thandal, who won the seat consecutively from 1997 to 2012. In election rallies, he mostly targets AAP. “They used to criticise the Congress for nepotism, but see what they have done. First, they gave ticket to a turncoat (Raj Kumar) in the MP elections and now fielded his son,” he says. He also blames the state government for making farmers suffer.
Change in support base
Except for 1992 elections when BSP had bagged the then Mahilpur seat, the scheduled caste voters of this reserved constituency have been voting majorly for the Congress and the SAD. AAP made its presence felt in 2017 when it upset the applecart of the Congress. Between 2017 and 2022, the vote share of the Congress declined from 49.96% to 41.02% whereas AAP’s vote share rose from 17.71% to 34.40%. SAD’s share fell from 24.7% to16.74%.
In last parliamentary elections, Sohan Singh Thandal, then with SAD, lost his security deposit as the BJP was no longer an ally. In the same election, Raj Kumar gained maximum lead in the Chabbewal segment, getting more than 27,000 votes than his nearest rival from the BJP. His two consecutive assembly wins and a parliamentary victory paved the way for his son’s nomination this time.
