Raja Warring Cong’s Bathinda pick, Ghubaya from Ferozepur

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, April 20

After waiting for days for the Akali Dal to open its cards on the Bathinda and Ferozepur Lok Sabha segments, the Congress today declared candidates for both the seats.

Congress chief Rahul Gandhi approved the candidature of former Indian Youth Congress president and Punjab MLA Amrinder Raja Warring from Bathinda. Sitting Ferozepur MP and former Akali Dal leader Sher Singh Ghubaya will contest from Ferozepur.

A Congress lawmaker from Gidderbaha, Warring had volunteered to fight from Bathinda while stalwarts refused to contest from this VVIP segment, currently represented in the Lok Sabha by Harsimrat Kaur Badal, the wife of Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal.

Punjab Local Bodies Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu, who was in Delhi today, and his wife Navjot Kaur declined to contest from Bathinda.

Sidhu said, “We can only contest from a segment where we can do justice. My wife had applied for a ticket from Chandigarh, which the party denied her. We have no regrets. We are loyal soldiers  and do the work we are assigned. We could have fought from Chandigarh or Amritsar. Amritsar is our home. But if someone tells us to go and fight from Bathinda, that we can’t do because we can’t do justice to that seat. ”

Sidhu said he would campaign for the Congress wherever he is asked to. 

In Ferozepur, the Congress today denied the claim of Punjab Sports Minister Rana Gurmeet Singh Sodhi to give the ticket to Ghubaya, who joined the party only recently. It remains to be seen how this announcement plays out in the Punjab unit ranks.

Both Rana Sodhi and his son Anumeet Sodhi had applied for the ticket from Ferozepur. With today’s announcement, the Congress has declared all 13 LS nominees from Punjab.