Just a year ago, Punjab was considered the easiest state to predict in the election cycle. The protests over three controversial farm laws were raging, resentment against the central government and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ran deep on the ground, the Congress government in the state had made all the right noises – passing a resolution in the assembly against the laws, backing the stir and assuring that the state would never implement the new legislation – and its
Just a year ago, Punjab was considered the easiest state to predict in the election cycle. The protests over three controversial farm laws were raging, resentment against the central government and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ran deep on the ground, the Congress government in the state had made all the right noises – passing a resolution in the assembly against the laws, backing the stir and assuring that the state would never implement the new legislation – and its principal adversary, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), had not yet shaken off the tag as the BJP’s ally and the ignominy of having appeared to initially back the laws.
However, a set of quick and each more unpredictable than the previous one developments have upended all calculations in the border state which usually throws up relatively decisive verdicts. Even as national attention is squarely trained on Uttar Pradesh, it is the neighbouring state that is witnessing perhaps the most fiercely contested assembly election in this cycle. Equally interesting, in one of the few states where the BJP hasn’t been able to expand its base and is actually looking at a shrinking footprint, far more is at stake for the national Opposition, which makes up both the defending incumbent and the primary challenger.
But first, a quick recap. The tumult first began in the summer of 2021 in the form of a rebellion against chief minister (CM) Amarinder Singh, who was seen at the time as a formidable leader and the Congress’s party’s presumptive CM face. Within days, it became clear that the rebellion had support from both within the party and among the public. The Congress allowed the infighting to drag on for months, before finally pushing out the two-time CM in September and installing Charanjit Singh Channi – much to the chagrin of Navjot Singh Sidhu, who had led the charge against his old nemesis Singh but appeared unhappy with anything less than the CM’s chair. The public squabbling of Congress leaders, the endless Delhi-Chandigarh round trips and the rumour mills of who met who ran for weeks, in stark contrast to the ruthless efficiency with which the BJP not just changed its CM for the second time in Uttarakhand but virtually replaced its entire cabinet in Gujarat.
Then, in a surprise November move, Prime Minister Narendra Modi repealed the three farm laws, thereby ending the mass agitation that long cemented the Congress’s status as the frontrunner. With the farm laws receding from public conversation, suddenly, the Congress’s internal troubles and its apparent inability to deliver on poll promises became starker election talking points, and allowed issues such as sacrilege, unemployment and drugs return to the public arena . More barbs exchanged between Sidhu and Channi only made the Congress’s rudderless campaign stand in stark contrast to a more disciplined effort by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and a low-key one by the SAD-BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party).
For the Congress, the stakes are the highest. Punjab was just one of three state governments the party ruled directly and was also the brightest possibility for a win in this election cycle – though it is in with a chance in Goa and Uttarakhand. It appears to have squandered some of its momentum in its leadership spat but can still win the election under Channi, undoubtedly the political find of the year who’s established an easy connect with the masses and holds a unique position as the first Dalit chief minister of a traditionally Jat Sikh-dominated party. It is unclear though whether his personal charm is enough to overcome deep unpopularity about the administration having done little to assuage public sentiment on deeply emotional issues such as sacrilege, especially when he continues to be undermined by leaders of his own party.
A victory is crucial for the Gandhi siblings, who appeared to have invested considerable political capital in the exit of Singh – who publicly blamed them for the episode – and then in naming Channi as the CM face, an announcement made by Rahul Gandhi himself. A loss will further undermine their authority in the party and encourage criticism of their leadership especially from their party colleagues already pushing for internal reform. With the other two states ruled by the Congress also going to the polls next year, it will also seriously erode the party’s claim of being the focal point of the national Opposition.
For the AAP, the elections represent the first real chance of fulfilling its national ambition by getting its first full state (Delhi as a Union Territory has only truncated powers) and culminate a tumultuous journey that began with Arvind Kejriwal’s naive electoral challenge to Modi in Varanasi in 2014. The party has run a smart campaign centred on Kejriwal’s promise of efficient welfare delivery and CM face Bhagwant Mann’s sharp questioning of the Congress’s inability to stamp out drug abuse and the sand mafia or punish people accused of desecration. Many commentators and surveys see the AAP as pulling ahead of the Congress, albeit marginally – but remember that similar predictions were made before the 2017 elections when the debutante party was expected to get anywhere between 40 to 60 seats but ended up getting around 20. There is as yet no proof that the mile wide and inch deep base that hurt the party in 2017 (its support dramatically thinned as one moved outwards from highways into the pind) has been dramatically altered. But a victory for AAP will mean renewed focus on its national role, a truly non-Congress alternative (other claimants such as Mamata Banerjee have roots in the larger Congress parivar) and more emulation of its delivery focussed, ideology-light political mantra.
This is a curious election because the victor will shape Opposition dynamics more than affect the ruling dispensation. Yet, the BJP is an important aspect of this campaign and one of three key unknown factors.
The first, of course, is the SAD-BSP alliance. This coalition of extremes between the original Panthic party and the Dalit-led outfit has run a surprisingly robust campaign focussed on issues and tried to maximise its strength. There are problems though. The SAD, the BJP’s oldest ally, still suffers from its name being associated with the party that brought the farm laws and the BSP has never done well in a state where Dalits are a third of the population. Plus, the unresolved 2015 police firings during the sacrilege protests and proliferation of drugs continue to dog the last SAD administration. Still, the party retains pockets of intense support and has deep roots in Sikh seats of power. In a close election, if the alliance gets anything more than 15 seats, expect it to occupy a seat at the government formation table.
Two, Singh’s new Punjab Lok Congress has tied up with the BJP, and curiously emerged as the junior partner in the alliance. Singh’s stature has diminished in the state but he is still popular in Patiala. It is unclear, though, how deep the anti-BJP sentiment is among the party’s traditional vote base, Hindu businessmen, middle castes and traders in urban areas.
Three, the unpredictability of the Congress itself. Having declared its leader with just two weeks of campaigning left, the party cannot afford any further undercutting of Channi. Yet, the barbs hurled by Sidhu’s family members indicate that not all tempers have cooled. The party has somewhat of a cushion (it won 38.5% of the vote share last time, compared to the AAP’s 23.7% and SAD-BJP’s 30.6%) but would do well to unite.
In every election, competing narratives play out on the ground even as leaders jockey for sound bytes and television coverage. This election, for example, is the perhaps the first in Punjab’s turbulent political history when the power of its Dalit population – which is by proportion the highest in the country but was never seen as a potent political instrument due to fragmentation – is front and centre. This is also an election where the single-biggest issue of farm laws has morphed into more everyday questions of agrarian distress and unsteady incomes that provide no clear political leanings. And, this is also an election where both contenders are vying to be the ultimate common man – Channi’s aam aadmi vs Kejriwal-Mann’s aam aadmi. In this unusually close race, the victor may be decided in the last lap.
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