LS poll: AAP to field Dhawan from city

Ramkrishan Upadhyay 

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 20

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has become the first major party to announce the name of its candidate for the Chandigarh Lok Sabha seat to be contested this year.

During a rally at Barnala in Punjab today, former Union Minister Harmohan Dhawan was announced as the party candidate for the Chandigarh seat. Delhi Chief Minister and AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal was present on the occasion.

Dhawan had left the BJP in November last year. In 1989, Dhawan had contested the Chandigarh seat on the Janata Party ticket and was elected to the Lok Sabha. He had served as the Civil Aviation Minister in the then Chandra Shekhar Government. 

Dhawan’s supporters and AAP workers greeted him at Tribune Chowk as he reached the city this evening.

The development is going to create a flutter in political parties like the Congress and the BJP, which are facing infighting over Lok Sabha ticket.

When contacted, Dhawan said he would go before the public with a slogan “Promise versus performance”. He said many important projects like the third phase of the Kajauli Water Works, government medical college and rehabilitation of slum dwellers in Mauli Jagran were started during his tenure. Dhawan had joined the BJP before the last parliamentary election and was denied the ticket for the LS seat at the last moment. Thereafter, his relationship with the party’s local leaders remained strained .The former Union Minister said AAP would provide the residents an alternative to the BJP and the Congress. He said people were fed up with both the parties. He alleged that the two parties did not fulfil promises they made before election. AAP had fielded actor Gul Panag from Chandigarh seat in the last Lok Sabha elections. She had polled over one lakh votes.