AAP retains Ludhiana West against odds, a Rajya Sabha seat for Arvind Kejriwal may be next
In a significant boost for the embattled Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Punjab, the party's Sanjeev Arora won the bitter Ludhiana West bypoll Monday by a decent margin of over 10,637 votes.
Arora, a prominent industrialist, who is a sitting Rajya Sabha MP of the AAP, defeated the Congress's Bharat Bhushan Ashu, a former minister and two-time MLA. It was the second consecutive defeat for Ashu from Ludhiana West, an urban constituency dominated by Hindu voters. The Akali Dal's slide continues, with the party finishing even behind the BJP to end up fourth.
In the 2022 Assembly elections, the AAP's Gurpreet Bassi Gogi had won from Ludhiana West, defeating Ashu. The bypoll was necessitated due to Gogi's death.
The speculation all through the campaign was that if Arora won, the Rajya Sabha seat vacated by him would be filled by AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal. Even if that does not happen, the Ludhiana West victory will come as a breather for the party that lost power to the BJP in Delhi, with even Kejriwal losing his seat, and whose Punjab government has been beset with problems.
The takeaways from Monday's result:
The Ludhiana West bypoll, coming soon after the AAP defeat in Delhi for the first time since its formation, was seen as a test of if the party could bounce back. Leaving nothing to chance, the AAP was the first to declare Arora as its candidate – doing so in February itself, long before the elections were even announced – and deployed an array of star leaders to campaign.
In a major action, a protest by farmers on the Shambhu and Khanauri borders of Punjab, blocking highways for months and inconveniencing movement, was removed overnight, as the business community and industrialists, including from Ludhiana, complained to the AAP government over their mounting losses.
During the campaign, Kejriwal made tall promises for Ludhiana and told voters to pick 'the humble and hardworking' Arora, not 'the angry and arrogant' Ashu, and to go with the ruling party in the state. If Arora won, Kejriwal said, he would be made a minister and 'get several projects to Ludhiana'.
A defeat in Ludhiana West would have emboldened the Opposition, which has been accusing the AAP Delhi leadership of holding the reins of the Punjab government, including in appointments to government postings, of indulging in 'VVIP culture', and of failure to tackle the drug menace and meet pre-poll promises such as its cash scheme for women.
One barb the AAP would have found it difficult to dodge was how it had 'used' Arora, just to get Kejriwal to Parliament.
A two-time MLA from Ludhiana West (2012, 2017), Ashu hoped to make a comeback in the bypoll after his defeat to the AAP's Gogi in 2022. A victory would have also been a nice payback for the AAP government imprisoning him for nearly a year in an alleged corruption case.
However, again, the Congress's campaign remained fragmented. The faction led by party Punjab chief and Ludhiana Lok Sabha MP Amrinder Singh Raja Warring and, including Leader of the Opposition Partap Singh Bajwa, stayed away from Ashu's campaign. The faction led by former CM Charanjit Singh Channi, and senior MLA Rana Gurjeet Singh and Pargat Singh threw its weight behind him.
The AAP repeatedly raised the fact that Ashu and Warring were not on talking terms with each other.
The BJP could not repeat its performance from the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, when it had led other parties in the Ludhiana West Assembly segment. However, BJP candidate Jiwan Gupta, whose candidature was announced at the fag end of nomination filing, managed a decent share of 22% votes.
That is a contrast to its former ally SAD, whose existential crisis continues. The party's Ludhiana West candidate, Advocate Parupkar Singh Ghumman, got just 9% of the votes, even though SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal camped in Ludhiana for days and headed the party's campaign in the bypolls.
The ruling AAP faced massive allegations of distributing cash, freebies, ration etc to the voters during the bypoll, and several complaints were filed against it by the Opposition parties.
The party also faced allegations of brazenly using administrative power and machinery in its campaigning.
After the results were declared, CM Mann said: 'This victory shows that the people of Punjab are extremely happy with the working of our government. We are working day and night for the progress and development of Punjab. We will fulfill every promise made during the bypoll.'
Ashu said he took 'the entire responsibility for this defeat'. 'I believe that the entire Congress was always with me. I will wholeheartedly support Arora whenever he needs me for Ludhiana's development. I congratulate him for the win.'
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