The Punjab Congress has started a campaign #PunjabChanniDeNaalHai. (File) AMID a clamour for announcing Charanjit Singh Channi as CM face of the Congress, a Twitter survey by AICC leader Rahul Gandhi’s close aide, Nikhil Alva, has revealed Channi to be the choice of maximum 68.7 per cent voters.
The poll, which sought to know who should be Congress’s CM face, has created a buzz in political circles.
The Twitter survey comes close on the heels of a telephonic survey by Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) following which it announced Bhagwant Mann as its CM candidate. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had stated that Mann got 93 per cent votes.
In Alva’s survey, having sample size of 1,283 votes, Navjot Sidhu got 11.5 per cent, Sunil Jakhar got 9.3, and 10.4 per cent people said that there was no need for a CM face.
The survey comes after a recent video put out by the Congress on its official Twitter handle that virtually projected Channi as the next CM of the state.
The Congress, however, has been insisting that it would contest elections under collective leadership. A few days ago, the party put up billboards across the state carrying pictures of Channi, Sidhu and Jakhar.
However, several leaders have already started demanding that Channi should be declared the CM face.
After ED raids against Chis kin, the party has thrown its weight behind Channi by calling it a conspiracy by Centre.
A Congress delegation on Thursday met Chief Election Commissioner to complain against BJP and AAP for “hatching a conspiracy against Channi and their bid to defame him”.
Senior leader Randeep Surjewala said that AAP and BJP had got together to defame Channi and the election panel should take cognisance of the development and intervene for the fair elections in the state.
The Punjab Congress, meanwhile, has started a campaign #PunjabChanniDeNaalHai on Twitter posting videos by saying that the entire state understood the conspiracy to defame Channi and they were with him.
Prominent among those who posted videos supporting Channi included party MLA Barindermeet Singh Pahda who is heard saying that the BJP had misused ED to raid Channi’s relative. He said free and fair elections were a requisite of a democracy and the Centre was trying to curb democracy.
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