As Bharatiya Janata Party stages a parallel “people’s assembly” in Chandigarh led by Sunil Kumar Jakhar and Ashwani Sharma, essentially running a shadow version of the Punjab Vidhan Sabha while attacking issues like drugs, law and order, and governance failures. Does this expose how badly the Aam Aadmi Party government has lost control of the narrative, or is BJP simply trying to manufacture relevance in a state where its electoral base still remains thin ahead of the 2027 battle?
जैसे भारतीय जनता पार्टी ने चंडीगढ़ में सुनील कुमार जाखड़ और अश्वनी शर्मा के नेतृत्व में एक समानांतर “जनता विधानसभा” आयोजित की, जो पंजाब विधानसभा की एक छाया जैसी दिखी और जिसमें नशा, कानून व्यवस्था और शासन की विफलताओं पर सवाल उठाए गए। क्या यह दिखाता है कि आम आदमी पार्टी सरकार अपनी पकड़ खो चुकी है, या फिर भाजपा 2027 के चुनाव से पहले एक ऐसे राज्य में अपनी मौजूदगी बढ़ाने की कोशिश कर रही है जहाँ उसका आधार अभी भी सीमित है ?
Punjab’s political numbers are throwing up a strange contrast, a party that won just 6.6% vote share and 2 out of 117 seats in 2022 now holds 6 out of 7 Rajya Sabha seats from the state after a wave of defections led by Raghav Chadha, with leaders like Ashwani Sharma backing the shift as a sign of growing influence, while the ruling Aam Aadmi Party still dominates the Assembly with over 90 MLAs. As Narendra Modi’s party expands its footprint in Parliament without matching ground strength in Punjab, and Bhagwant Mann dismisses defectors as politically insignificant, does this widening gap between electoral mandate and parliamentary power reflect a smart long-term strategy, or a fragile shortcut that may not hold in 2027 ?
