Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann on Saturday sought an appointment with President Draupadi Murmu to formally demand the recall of the state’s Rajya Sabha members who defected to the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Accompanied by a delegation of Aam Aadmi Party MLAs, Mann intends to present the AAP’s stance against the seven parliamentarians who switched sides on Friday. The chief minister’s move marks a significant escalation in the confrontation between the AAP and the BJP following the exodus of Raghav Chadha, Sandeep Pathak, Ashok Mittal, Harbhajan Singh, Rajinder Gupta, Swati Maliwal, and Vikramjit Sahney.
The defectors, led by Chadha and Pathak, claimed their departure was rooted in the party straying from its foundational principles. They have termed their move to the BJP as a factional merger.
However, Mann has countered this narrative with sharp rhetoric, labelling the leaders as traitors who have betrayed the mandate of the Punjabi people. To underscore his point, the chief minister took to X to share a culinary analogy in Punjabi. He compared the seven defectors to individual kitchen ingredients—ginger, garlic, cumin, fenugreek powder, red chilli, black pepper, and coriander—noting that while they contribute to the flavour of a dish when combined, they cannot constitute a meal on their own. This analogy was intended to highlight his view that the leaders lack independent political identity outside the framework of the AAP.
By taking the matter to the President, Mann aims to challenge the legality and ethics of the merger, asserting that the AAP’s overwhelming majority in the state assembly—where it holds 94 out of 117 seats—remains the true reflection of the public will. The petition to the President is expected to focus on the constitutional validity of the Rajya Sabha members continuing to represent the state under a different banner after being elected through the AAP’s legislative strength.
Mann questioned the democratic legitimacy and ground-level support of the departing MPs, asserting that none of them possess the electoral vote bank enjoyed by even a village sarpanch. He characterised the group as leaders without a mass base, suggesting their political value was entirely derived from the party they abandoned. The chief minister linked the timing of the defections to the BJP’s alleged unease over the enactment of strict laws against ‘beadbi’ (sacrilege) in Punjab and the visible progress made by his administration in sectors such as education, healthcare, and employment.
According to Mann, the BJP’s strategy of engineering defections is a direct result of its repeated rejection by the voters of Punjab. He accused the saffron party of using intimidation and inducements to weaken a corruption-free government because it lacks sufficient political ground in the state.
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