The Congress on Monday constituted an election committee under the chairmanship of Punjab party chief Navjot Singh Sidhu for next year’s Assembly polls.The party also approved a proposal for the appointment of the president and working presidents to 28 district Congress committees in Punjab.The state has 23 districts, of which Ludhiana, Amritsar, Patiala, Jalandhar and Bathinda have more than one committee.
In January this year, Congress national president Sonia Gandhi had dissolved the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee and district party committees.The Punjab Pradesh Election Committee will have Navjot Sidhu as its chairman, according to a party statement.Among those who are members of the committee are CM Charanjit Singh Channi, senior party leader and coordination committee chairperson Ambika Soni, former Punjab Congress chief and campaign committee chairman Sunil Jakhar, manifesto committee chief Partap Singh Bajwa, party’s all Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs and state ministers.
Former chief minister Rajinder Kaur Bhathal, former PPCC chiefs H S Hanspal, Mohinder Singh Kaypee, AICC secretary K L Sharma, MLA Raminder Singh Awla, senior vice-president of PPCC Laal Singh, PPCC working presidents Kuljit Nagra, Sukhvinder Singh Danny and Pawan Goyal are also part of the panel.The party has also included former ministers and MLAs Gurpreet Kangar, Balbir Singh Sidhu, Shyam Sunder Arora, Sadhu Singh Dharamsot and Rana Gurmit Singh Sodhi in this committee.
Five of them, who were earlier considered close to former chief minister Amarinder Singh, could not find place in the new cabinet led by Charanjit Singh Channi.MLAs Ajaib Singh Bhatti, Navtej Singh Cheema, Chairman of SC wing Raj Kumar Chabbewal, Punjab Mahila Congress chief Balbir Rani Sodhi, Punjab Youth Congress chief Barinder Dhillon, NSUI president Akashay Sharma and Punjab Seva Dal chief organiser Nirmal Kaira area also part of the committee.Meanwhile, the Congress appointed 28 presidents and 54 working presidents to district congress committees.In some district Congress committees like Jalandhar Urban, Fatehgarh Sahib, Gurdaspur, Tarn Taran, Ludhiana Urban, the party appointed more than one working president.It is for the first time that the party appointed a president along with working presidents in the district Congress committees.The Congress had last week announced various party panels for the Punjab polls, making Ajay Maken the head of the committee for screening of candidates and appointing former state unit president Sunil Jakhar as the campaign committee chief.Senior party leader Ambika Soni will chair the party’s coordination committee and another former state unit chief and Rajya Sabha member, Partap Singh Bajwa, is the chairman of the manifesto committee.
