Although unconvincing, speculations had started about the future of Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann in the aftermath of the recent General Elections.
As the ruling Aam Aadmi Party fared very badly, losing 10 of the 13 parliamentary seats, questions had started about the future of the Chief Minister.
However, an emphatic victory by a margin of over 37,000 votes in the Jalandhar West by-elections has, at least for the time being, put those speculations to rest.
Even if the ruling party would not have won the Jalandhar West by-election, raising questions on Mann’s future was not quite convincing. Merely because the AAP did not perform well in the General Elections cannot be the sole criterion for reconsidering his role.
After all, Punjab was not the only state where the AAP did not do well.
Rather, it was here only that the AAP could win three seats on its own without any alliance with any other political party.
Compared to that, the AAP drew a blank for the third time in Delhi, where it has been in power for 12 years now.
Moreover, this time, the AAP had an alliance with the Congress in Delhi and it contested four of the seven seats there and lost all four.
Even the Congress lost the three seats it had got in the seat-sharing arrangement.
If the parliamentary performance is made a criterion, then Punjab comes after Delhi, where party’s performance was worse.
Rumours and speculations notwithstanding, the AAP, in all likelihood should not be considering any leadership change in Punjab for multiple reasons.
Chief Minister Mann has assumed a towering persona over the years. He remains the most popular leader of the state right now. He was the only face that the party could present and if it has a government in Punjab today, a lot of credit goes to Mann.
He may not be the perfect one, but he is not disappointing either. He has been the Chief Minister for just two and a half years. He will also need time to settle down.
The way he handled the Jalandhar West by-election campaign leading from the front, he proved that he was no less than anyone else, rather he was better than everyone else the way he made the party win against multiple odds.
The AAP must also learn from the Congress misadventure of September 2021, when it unceremoniously removed Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh.
The consequences were disastrous. Even Amarinder’s bitter critics are still regretting having got him replaced, saying the party would not have met the same fate it met after removing him.
Anti-incumbency and rebellion are in Punjab’s blood. It was not the first time that the ruling party/alliance faced such drubbing in Punjab in the General Elections. It has been continuously happening here since 1999, except in 2019, when the ruling party has faced adverse results in the parliamentary elections.
Also the poor performance in the General Elections does not necessarily lead to equally bad performance eventually in the assembly elections. General Elections and assembly elections are two entirely different ball games. Delhi is an example where the AAP sweeps the assembly elections, while the BJP sweeps the parliamentary elections.
Right now, and possibly for the future also, Mann appears to be saddled perfectly and stably in his chair. The circumstances and his own performance, both should give him enough hope and confidence that he remains indispensable for the party as, so far, he does not have any alternative and odds remain heavily in his favour.
This does not mean that there is no scope for improvement. The AAP, both as a party and government in Punjab, has a long way to go. The AAP is going the same way the Congress used to go between 2017 and 2022. There is a lot of dissatisfaction among the AAP workers, even among the party legislators.
While the AAP has set up the party infrastructure, it has neither been energized nor empowered. To energise the workers, they must be empowered.
The workers and the legislators are an important interface between the government and the common people who are the actual voters. That interface may not be missing, but it certainly is not strong. Rather it is quite weak and ineffective.
Like, during the Congress regime, there was a general complaint that the bureaucracy was “unaccountable and unresponsive” towards the party workers, leaders and even legislators and in some cases even to the ministers.
Similar complaints are coming from the AAP quarters also. Newly elected MP from Anandpur Sahib parliamentary constituency, Malwinder Singh Kang went on record to say that the AAP was harmed most by the bureaucracy. And he was not off the mark.
Bureaucracy has entrenched itself so strongly, that it has become a law unto itself, as it knows that while the political executive is transitional, bureaucracy is permanently there.
This misimpression must be dispelled.
After all, it is the politicians who are accountable to the people. It is them who have to seek votes and not the bureaucrats. Mann has so far already faced four elections after becoming the Chief Minister in 2022.
That is the level of accountability any politician, unlike the bureaucrats, is subjected to. The bureaucrats can manage with simple references from the right quarters coupled with a certain quantum of opportunism, which most of them do not lack, rather possess in abundance.
The bureaucrats enjoy, in some cases they even abuse, power at the cost of the interests and the credibility of the political executive.
It has been a standard practice of influential bureaucrats to project the political leaders as “corrupt and unscrupulous, always wanting to get illegal things done” and project themselves as saints. This happens in every regime, irrespective of the party and politicians are always at a loss.
Chief Minister Mann has the ability and potential to tame such officers and ensure and enforce their accountability. The sooner he does, the better it will be for his government, for his party and for the state as a whole.
Follow us
