They were candidates whom not many took seriously or took the pains to go meet. But these six Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) contestants have turned out to be giant slayers in Punjab, sending home the big wheels of Punjab politics, including four former chief ministers.
At News18, however, we made it a point to meet some of them during the poll campaign. Let’s begin with mobile phone repair shop owner Labh Singh Ugoke, who was the AAP nominee from Bhadaur, which CM Charanjit Singh Channi chose as one of the two places to contest from. When News18 had caught up with Ugoke in a small village in the constituency last month, he told us that he was surprised the national media was searching for him and that this was his first election after working as a groundworker for AAP for the past few years. Ugoke is a protege of the new CM, Bhagwant Mann, and was living in a two-room dwelling in a village in Bhadaur.
Then take the case of 50-year-old Jeevan Jyot Kaur, AAP’s candidate in Amritsar (East) where many presumed the fight was between the big names, Navjot Singh Sidhu and Bikram Majithia. But Kaur managed to beat both of them on the seat. This is also Kaur’s first election and she drew AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal’s attention after her work as a ‘pad woman’ in Punjab who provided sanitary napkins to women in the state’s jails and has been a social worker for over two decades. “I don’t want Amritsar to become another Majithia,” she had told News18 about her fight. Kaur has risen through the ranks in AAP since 2015.
Also meet Ajit Pal Singh Kohli, a former mayor of Patiala who was with the Akali Dal but jumped ship to the Aam Aadmi Party to take on Captain Amarinder Singh. He defeated both the Captain and the Congress candidate from the Patiala seat, Vishnu Sharma, though this constituency had been held by Amarinder and the Congress party for three decades now. Kamboj had told News18 in Patiala that AAP stood a good chance there as locals were tired of both the Captain and the Congress as nothing was done for the city’s development.
CM Charanjit Singh Channi lost his seat of Chamkaur Sahib to his namesake Charanjit Singh of AAP who is a doctor and had contested against him in the 2017 elections too but lost. Singh had constantly challenged Channi, telling News18 during campaigning that the CM had to pick the second seat of Bhadaur fearing his defeat from Chamkaur Sahib. Singh had also raised illegal sand mining and the raids on Channi’s nephew by the Enforcement Directorate as prominent issues during campaigning in the Chamkaur Sahib constituency.
Then, there is 37-year-old Jagdeep Kamboj ‘Goldy’ of AAP who has ended the reign of former deputy CM and Akali Dal president Sukhbir Singh Badal from Jalalabad and that too by over 30,000 votes. Kamboj is a youth leader of AAP and headed its backward classes wing. He was made the district incharge by the party and picked as the Jalalabad candidate last December. Arvind Kejriwal and Bhagwant Mann did roadshows for Kamboj in Lambi to throw their full weight behind him.
The biggest surprise of all, however, seems to be in the Lambi seat itself, where former five-time CM and MLA for 25 years, Parkash Singh Badal, has been humbled by AAP candidate Gurmeet Singh Khudian who is also a former Congress leader and comes from a political family. In the past, even Captain Amarinder Singh had to taste defeat against Badal from Lambi. Khudian’s father was an MP but was found dead in mysterious circumstances near a canal. He has been against the Badals for long and finally got even with them. “Badal did nothing for Lambi. Everyone says no one can defeat him. I will prove them wrong,” he had told News18.
So confident were Kejriwal and Mann about these candidates that they had openly said and even written on a piece of paper before the media that both Badals would lose their seats, Bikram Majithia and Sidhu would be defeated and Channi would be beaten on both seats.
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