3 woman MLAs make way for men in family

Saturday, 17/12/2016

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CHANDIGARH: The chivalrous “ladies first” makes way for the patriarchal “man of the family” when it comes to politics in Punjab. No wonder, three Congress legislators dropped out of the 2017 poll race in favour of male members in their families.

Call them society’s paradigm of the ideal women, but their move could be a political compulsion. Former chief minister and state Congress stalwart Captain Amarinder Singh’s wife will vacate her Patiala (urban) constituency for her husband.

Preneet Kaur, a three-time parliamentarian for Patiala and a former junior foreign minister, dropped ranks to become a state legislator in the Captain’s home turf after he got elected to Parliament from Amritsar in 2014. Patiala lost the Captain, but Kaur chipped in, contested the bypoll, won and kept the family fortress from going to an “outsider”.

But there’s a catch. Kaur was chosen over son Raninder Singh because he had failed to win polls twice — Bathinda parliamentary seat in 2009 and the Samana assembly constituency in 2012.

Besides, Kaur’s move now is in line with the Captain’s “one family, one ticket” dictate for fellow partymen.

A similar case happened with Charanjit Kaur Bajwa, the MLA for Qadian, who moved aside for brother-in-law Fateh Jang Singh Bajwa. In the process, she became peacemaker in a sibling rivalry.

Husband Partap Singh Bajwa, a Rajya Sabha MP, is being accused of lobbying for his wife that denied younger brother Fateh a ticket for Qadian in 2012. Both are sons of former Punjab minister Satnam Singh Bajwa; Partap being the eldest. They are fighting for their father’s legacy.

Legacy made Guriqbal Kaur an MLA for Nawanshahr in 2012, fielded after husband Parkash Singh died before the polls. Always a reluctant politician, she has passed the baton to Angad Saini, her 25-year-old son, the youngest among 61 candidates on the Congress list released on Thursday.

The list, however, didn’t have the turncoats — especially heavyweights such as Sarwan Singh Phillaur, Pargat Singh and Inderbir Singh Bolaria who switched loyalties from the Shiromani Akali Dal to the Congress, and Navjot Kaur Sidhu, who was with the BJP. Thereby hangs a tale.

The Congress appears to be treading cautiously because unseating an established partyman from a seat to accommodate a new inductee could trigger a mutiny, a prospect it can ill-afford in its quest to wrest power from the Akali-BJP alliance. Former hockey captain Pargat Singh was earmarked for the Jalandhar cantonment seat, which he won as an Akali nominee in 2012. But that could miff seasoned Congress leader Jagbir Brar, who has been grooming this seat. The party wants to shift him to Nakodar. But Brar won’t budge.