Amit Shah with SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal during a meeting, Thursday. (Photo: Twitter/ @AmitShah)Alliance partners the Akali Dal and the BJP will contest the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls in Punjab as per the seat sharing arrangement followed during the 2014 polls. SAD, as per the formula, will contests on ten seats and BJP on three.
This was decided during a meeting of top leaders of both parties chaired by BJP president Amit Shah at his Delhi residence Thursday. The meeting, which lasted around 90 minutes, was attended by SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal and Punjab BJP president Shwait Malik among others.
“SAD-BJP alliance with fight the 2019 Lok Sabha elections together. Their seats will remain the same as they were in 2014. SAD will contest on 10 seats and the BJP on three,” Shah tweeted after the meeting. Sukhbir also confirmed the same after coming out of the meeting.
The issue of seat swapping was not discussed in the meeting, a SAD leader said. SAD president had earlier said both parties will discuss seat swapping. The comment had come amid talk that SAD wanted Amritsar seat to be swapped with Ludhiana and Jalandhar with Hoshiarpur.
In Punjab, BJP contests from Amritsar, Gurdaspur and Hoshiarpur seats, while SAD contests from Khadoor Sahib, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Ferozepur, Faridkot, Bathinda, Sangrur, Patiala, Fatehgarh Sahib and Anandpur Sahib.
It was decided in the meeting that a coordination committee of top leadership of SAD and BJP in Punjab would be constituted and would meet every week to chalk out the strategy for the polls. On March 10, district presidents of both parties would meet at Chandigarh for coordination of strategy at the district level.
Sukhbir Badal said the partners would organise “Vishwas-ghat Diwas” (Betrayal Day) on March 16, the day Amarinder Singh was sworn in as CM in 2017.
He said massive protests would be held in major cities of all the 117 Assembly constituencies against “false oath” by CM Amarinder Singh and unfulfilled promises made to the electorate.
“With this meeting, we are in poll mode. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah will be addressing rallies in the state and in due course of time we will be suggesting the venues for the rallies,” said senior Akali leadersNaresh Gujral.
