Amarinder hails Gurdaspur win

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh today hailed the Congress win in the Gurdaspur Lok Sabha by-poll as a "total rejection of the anti-people policies" of the BJP and its ally the SAD and said it underlines the "political annihilation" of the AAP.

The Gurdaspur result has once again shown that the Congress was on the path of revival across the country, he said.

"The massive win for Congress candidate Sunil Jakhar shows the people's complete denunciation of the corrupt and immoral BJP and SAD," the chief minister said, adding that it also underlines the "political annihilation" of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the state.
 

He said that it's a victory for the Congress and the party's policies and development agenda.

The chief minister assured the people of Gurdaspur that every single promise made by the party will be fulfilled and development works will be fast-tracked.

Amarinder Singh said he was humbled by the faith reposed in the Congress candidate, who won by a margin of over 1.90 lakh votes over his nearest rival of BJP Swaran Salaria, and thanked the voters for their overwhelming love and support.

The over 1.93 lakh margin of victory has not only more than compensated for the 1.36 lakh vote defeat of Congress candidate Pratap Singh Bajwa against BJPs Vinod Khanna in 2014 but has surpassed even the 1.51 lakh lead by which Sukhbans Kaur Bhinder (Congress) had won in 1980, he said.

"Jakhars victory comes as a strong rebuttal to the persistent Akali efforts and campaign of the past six months to undermine the work being done by his government in the state," he added.

"For AAP, this election marks the end of its political ambitions in Punjab," Amarinder Singh said, pointing out that the dissolution of the Pathankot and Gurdaspur units of AAP a day before the declaration of the results showed that the party had conceded defeat and accepted that it had completely failed to connect with the people of the state.

Dubbing the alleged moral bankruptcy of the BJP and the total failure of the party at the Centre as the key factors behind the crushing defeat of its candidate, Amarinder said the people wanted development, which only the Congress could give them.

"The people were completely aware of the welfare initiatives taken by the Congress government since taking over the state's reins in March this year," he said in a statement here, adding that they had full faith in the governments commitment to their progress.

"Both the BJP-SAD and AAP had stooped to the lowest levels in their brazen attempts to mislead the people with their false propaganda against the Congress government," Amarinder alleged.

"It was evident that these parties failed to learn their lessons despite the fact that such cheap tactics did not succeed in voting them to power in the Assembly polls earlier this year," he added.

Amarinder Singh said, "while the SAD went all out to deceive the people with its false statements on various issues, especially farm loan waiver, AAP once again resorted to street politics and theatrics in a desperate bid to grab the seat".

The fact that both the parties suffered a crushing defeat "showed that the people of Gurdaspur had the maturity to distinguish the right from the wrong and trusted the Congress to lead them out of the depths of miseries into which they had been pushed by the erstwhile SAD-BJP government".

The chief minister came down heavily on the BJP and the AAP for their personal attacks on Jakhar, who they tried to project as an 'outsider all through the campaign, without, however, making any dent in his clean image and sincere commitment.

"Development was the only thing the people of Gurdaspur were concerned about," he said, and added that for a region deprived of growth for so many years, the domicile of the candidate was completely irrelevant as they only wanted someone with sincerity and dedication.

Describing Jakhar as an ideal representative to raise the voice of the people of Gurdaspur in Parliament, Amarinder assured the people of Gurdaspur that all promises made to them by the Congress MP would be fulfilled.

"The development work initiated in the region in the past six-odd months would get a major boost with Jakhar taking on the mantle of representing the region in the Lok Sabha," he asserted.

Amarinder said the Gurdaspur result once again showed that the Congress was on the path of revival across the country.

"The party's recent victory in several university students union elections and its resounding win in the Maharashtra civic polls just two days ago were clear indicators that the partys fortunes were on the upswing and the result of the Gurdaspur bypoll further strengthened its prospects for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections," he added.