What Really Helped The Congress in Punjab Is Amarinder Singh Being Made A Clear CM-Candidate

After all the sound and fury Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has emerged the biggest loser of 2017 Punjab. The party is standing right where it was after the 2014 Lok Sabha polls with 23.6 per cent votes going by latest trends. In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections AAP got 24.4 per cent votes. Thus, AAP votes have declined in the assembly.

It is also clear that the AAP has cut into just the Shiromani Akali Dal’s votes. For, the SAD has descended from nearly 35 per cent vote share in 2012 to 25 per cent this time. This decline was underway since 2007 but AAP has pushed it further along. In 2007 SAD had 37 per cent votes.

The Congress in Punjab was always sniping at SAD’s heels but alliance arithmetic—SAD has partnered with the BJP—helped it form the government in 2012, even get more seats. (Though even the BJP’s vote share and seats have been declining). With the Congress Party also standing still in Punjab, with vote shares similar to 2007 and 2012, where else did the AAP make a dent but in SAD?

This fact explains why the Congress is the clear winner in Punjab. The old warhorse Amarinder Singh has turned his last electoral battle into a resounding success, made Punjab the one assembly his party is securing a clear lead over rivals in. But even Amarinder was fully “activated” just about two months before the state went to polls. Even then, state Congress leaders were engaged in plenty of in-fighting. What really seems to have helped the Congress is Amarinder Singh being made a clear CM-candidate, his emotional plea to voters to make his last contest a success, and huge support for him from the Jatt Sikhs.

As to why AAP lost, more answers lie in the panthic or Sikh religious vote that has proved once again to be loyal to the Akali Dal. Thus, without the strong support of a large section of Sikh youth, Punjab has once again demonstrated, no party can truly defeat the SAD. That is, the Sikh youth was divided between the AAP and the SAD, thus it is only the Congress that could scrape through.

In this way, the Punjab verdict is a replay of what had happened in 2014. That year too, the AAP rode into Malwa—a region known for rebelliousness—in the Majha and Doaba it raised plenty of sound and dust but no Lok Sabha seats. This year too, in Amritsar, Tarn Taran and Majithia, the heartland of Panthic seats, the Congress and the Akalis were visibly confident in the run-up to the elections. Support from the deras for the Akalis only cemented this, swinging to its’ favour those who were divided. Thirdly, the AAP has no track record in Punjab. That means, only the emotionally-connected voter, who is also voting against the incumbent party, would vote for AAP. This did not help AAP either, for the Jatt Sikh, it is evident, has found solace in Amarinder Singh, a Jatt Sikh himself.

Considering the steady vote share of the Congress in Punjab since 2007, it is evident that the party leadership had been playing a game of wait and watch since the last two electoral verdicts. This is why the 2017 results raise two important questions. First, had the AAP not been contesting these polls, would the Akali Dal have scraped through again? Second, minus the AAP, would the Congress have been as vociferous as it was in the last five or six weeks, in taking on the Akali Dal for “misrule”? This would, quite possibly, have been a very different election had the AAP not been around.

AAP’s presence in Punjab made this a three-way contest but without any impact whatsoever on the Congress and Amarinder Singh, at least, not beyond Malwa. Certainly many reasons will be attributed to this, but they include the Dalit voter also staying with Congress in Doaba and Majha areas. Punjab has a 31 per cent Dalit population, the highest ratio in India.

AAP’s assurance of a Dalit deputy chief minister could not woo voters, nor did its track record in Delhi inspire confidence. This is perhaps because AAP has no real Dalit representation in Delhi, while its leaders such as Rakhi Birla did not last very long. Secondly, lack of a strong CM candidate did not help its’ prospects, while it overestimated just how many youth were with it, and the popularity of Arvind Kejriwal.

VOTE SHARE (PER CENT) OF KEY PARTIES IN PUNJAB

INC
2017: 38.6
2012: 40.11
2007: 40.94

SAD
2017: 25 per cent
2012:
34.75 per cent

AAP
2017: 23.6 per cent
2014: 24.4 per cent Lok Sabha