Navjot Singh Sidhu (in photo) and Amarinder Singh have been sparring for months.
Chandigarh:
It may be too early to call it a truce, but Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu’s latest tweets on the electricity crisis in Punjab suggest some thaw in the dissident’s icy ties with Chief Minister Amarinder Singh.
A week after including the Chief Minister in a broadside on opponents over the power shortage, the cricketer-turned-politician reserved his renewed attack only for the Congress’s rivals – Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and the Badal family-led Shiromani Akali Dal.
Today, Forces bent-upon Punjab’s destruction are clearly visible … 1. Delhi Govt wants Punjab’s lifeline our Thermal Power Plants to shut down in middle of Punjab’s Power crisis leaving Punjabis helpless in this simmering heat & our Farmers suffer in this Paddy-sowing season !!
— Navjot Singh Sidhu (@sherryontopp) July 10, 2021
2. Meanwhile Badals-signed PPAs with Thermal Power Plants & Majithia as Minister Renewable Energy (2015-17) signed PPAs for 25 Years for Solar Power at Rs 5.97 to 17.91 per unit to loot Punjab knowing cost of solar is decreasing 18% per year since 2010 & is Rs 1.99 per unit today
— Navjot Singh Sidhu (@sherryontopp) July 10, 2021
The absence of any mention of the Amarinder Singh administration in the tweets was enough to set off the buzz that perhaps some progress has been made in the party leadership’s efforts to address the rift between two of its top leaders in Punjab, months before crucial elections.
Only last week Mr Sidhu had put out a series of tweets on the power crisis that grazed Captain Singh: “There is no need for power cuts in Punjab or for the Chief Minister to regulate office timings or AC use of the common people … if we act in the right direction.”
The statement was followed by a well-timed disclosure from sources in Amarinder Singh’s power department that Mr Sidhu, even in the middle of his commentary on the crisis, owed more than Rs 8 lakh in unpaid electricity bills.
With no end to the feud in sight, Captain Singh boarded a helicopter to meet Congress president Sonia Gandhi in Delhi earlier this week and said he would accept “whatever decision is taken by the Congress high command”, suggesting a resolution may be on the horizon.
His meeting with Sonia Gandhi came just days after Navjot Sidhu met Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi in Delhi and a week after Mr Singh met a three-member panel appointed by Sonia Gandhi to recommend a solution to the Punjab feud.
Sources say the Congress has been working on a formula to bring the Chief Minister on board with a formula that would require Mr Sidhu to be accommodated in a top post in Punjab amid months-long sparring between the two leaders that have endangered the Congress’s re-election prospects.
