Hoshiarpur
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Vijay Sampla, who has been denied ticket from the Hoshiarpur parliamentary constituency, is likely to join the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), people close to the prominent Dalit leader said.
Soon after the BJP announced sitting member of Parliament Som Parkash’s wife as its candidate from the reserved constituency on Tuesday, Sampla had dropped the hint by adding a post on his X account, that he was open to consider other options. “Ek raasta bandh hota hai to bhagwan aur kai raaste khol deta hai (If one door closes, God opens many others),” he had posted on X and also removed “Modi ka parivaar” tag from his social media profile.
Sampla, who headed the National Commission for Scheduled Castes from 2021 to 2023 and remained a minister of state for social justice and empowerment from 2014 to 2019, claims to have a huge following in Hoshiarpur, an SC reserved constituency, which he represented from 2014 to 2019.
He is in constant touch with the SAD leadership and will join the party on Friday, said Sampla’s close aide, adding that the SAD is likely to field him from Hoshiarpur.
{{/usCountry}}He is in constant touch with the SAD leadership and will join the party on Friday, said Sampla’s close aide, adding that the SAD is likely to field him from Hoshiarpur.
{{/usCountry}}People privy to the matter said some of Sampla’s supporters wanted him to explore his chances in the Congress, which is also looking for a suitable candidate after its SC face Raj Kumar Chabbewal switched loyalties to the Aam Aadmi Party and got nominated for the ticket, but the former saw SAD as a better option. It is learnt that the SAD high command has taken local leaders into confidence who are ready to accept Sampla as their candidate as they have worked with him in 2014 when he won the seat as a nominee of the BJP-SAD alliance.
Sampla’s protégé Sanjiv Talwar, who had also left the BJP sometime ago, is also likely to join the SAD.
So far, Sampla himself has neither denied nor confirmed the move to leave the saffron party.
“I am meeting my supporters and collecting their views. A suitable decision will be taken as per their wishes,” he said.
People close to Sampla revealed that it was end of the road for him in the BJP and that was why he thought of considering other options.
“He was unceremoniously removed from the chairmanship of the National Commission for Scheduled Caste, but was given the impression that he will be assigned a bigger role in the party. He started preparing ground for the Lok Sabha elections but the party ignored him and chose Som Parkash’s wife. To continue or to leave is his personal decision,” said a senior BJP leader.
Another leader said that Sampla had earned the displeasure of national leadership when he objected to denial of ticket in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and had termed it “cow slaughter” on social media.
“The BJP fielded Sampla from Phagwara assembly segment in 2022 polls but he lost his deposit,” the BJP leader mentioned above said.
Sampla had started his political career by contesting panchayat elections from Jalandhar’s Sofi village and from a sarpanch, he rose through the ranks to become an MP and president of the state unit of BJP. He also headed Punjab Khadi and Village Industries Board and state forest development corporation.