Amarinder Singh wins with highest margin
Sunday, 12/03/2017
http://epaper.dailypostindia.com/Details.aspx?id=174666&boxid=71635&uid=&dat=2017-03-12
Chandigarh : Punjab Congress president Captain Amarinder Singh not only steered the party to victory but his winning margin was the highest in the 117-member state assembly.
The scion of the erstwhile Patiala royal family won convincingly with a margin of 52,407 votes as he crushed his nearest rival AAP candidate Balbir Singh.
The former Punjab Chief Minister polled 72,586 votes while Balbir got 20,179 votes.
Akali candidate and former Army chief J J Singh who was confident of his victory against Amarinder secured just 11,677 votes.
Amarinder not only recorded highest margin but also bettered his margin of 42,318 secured in 2012 Assembly polls.
After Amarinder, Congress candidate and cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu won the polls with second highest margin of 42,809 votes.
The former BJP MP defeated nearest rival BJP candidate Rajesh Kumar Honey. Sidhu, who joined Congress this year, polled 60,477 votes while Honey got just 17,668 votes.
AAP candidate Sarabjot Singh got 14,715 votes.
Meanwhile, Congress candidate from Fazilka Davinder Singh Ghubaya won the Fazilka seat with lowest margin of 265 votes as the poll contest with BJP MLA and cabinet minister Surjit Jayani remained neck to neck.
From Batala seat, SAD candidate Lakhbir Singh Lodhinangal won against Congress candidate Ashwani Sekhri with a margin of 485 votes.
AAP’s big guns mis-fire in Punjab
Chandigarh : Several of the rookie Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) top guns bit the dust at the husting as the party ended a distant second in the assembly polls won by the Congress.
AAP finished second with 20 seats, but managed to relegate SAD-BJP alliance to third spot.
AAP’s campaign committee in-charge and party MP Bhagwant Mann, party convener Gurpreet Singh Ghuggi, journalist-turned- politician Jarnail Singh, legal cell in-charge Himmat Singh Shergill and Dr Balbir Singh lost in the polls.
Mann lost to Shiromani Akali Dal supremo and deputy chief minister Sukhbir Singh Badal from Jalalabad while Shergill lost to Bikram Singh Majithia from Majithia.
Incidentally, Jarnail Singh had quit as an MLA from Rajouri Garden assembly seat in Delhi to contest against Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and Amarinder Singh from Lambi.
Senior lawyer H S Phoolka, who has been fighting for the 1984 anti-Sikh riots victims, AAP spokesman Sukhpal Singh Khaira, a former Congressman, journalist-turned-politician Kanwar Sandhu, trader cell in-charge Aman Arora, Harpal Singh Cheema, Manjit Singh and Prof Baljinder Singh were among those who won their seats.
Taking everybody by surprise in 2014 Lok Sabha polls, AAP won four seats in the state. Later, the party suspended two of its MPs.
BSP, Left parties CPI and CPI (M), Apna Punjab Party and Trinamool Congress (TMC) failed to open their account.
