Capt. Amarinder Singh to join BJP next week: PLC spokesman

The former Punjab CM, Captain Amarinder Singh, 80, who had gone to London for spinal surgery, had met Union Home Minister Amit Shah last week.

NewsBharati    16-Sep-2022 15:50:32 PM
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New Delhi, Sept 16: Former chief minister and Punjab Lok Congress chief Amarinder Singh is all set to join the BJP next week in New Delhi. Singh will also merge his newly formed party, the Punjab Lok Congress (PLC), with the BJP.
 

Amarinder Singh 
 
The former Punjab CM, Captain Amarinder Singh, 80, who had gone to London for spinal surgery, had met Union Home Minister Amit Shah last week.
 
 
 
A former Congress veteran, Amarinder resigned from the membership of the grand old party in early November last year, one-and-half months after he was replaced with Charanjit Singh Channi as the CM by the Congress leadership in the wake of his protracted tussle with the then state party chief Navjot Singh Sidhu. After quitting Congress, Amarinder floated the PLC in the run-up to the February 20 Punjab Assembly elections. It contested the polls in alliance with the BJP and the SAD (Sanyukt). According to their seat-sharing arrangement, the BJP contested 65 seats, the PLC on 37 (with a number of candidates preferring to compete on the BJP symbol), and the SAD (Sanyukt) on 15 seats. All PLC candidates lost badly in the polls, with Amarinder losing from Patiala, his bastion. The BJP won two seats, while the SAD (Sanyukt), led by former Rajya Sabha member Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa, drew a blank. The Aam Aadmi Party had swept the elections, in which the Congress was decimated.
 
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Prime Minister Narendra Modi had called to inquire about Amarinder’s health on June 27 following his surgery. “It was just a call to inquire about the well-being of Captain Sahib,” he said. The BJP national executive member, Harjit Grewal, had told the media that the PLC’s merger with the BJP had been decided before Amarinder went to London and that it would be formally announced once he returned to the country.