Coming home for the first time

Coming home for the first time

Navjot Singh Sidhu might now describe himself as a “born Congressman” and his joining the Congress as “homecoming”, but he is without doubt driven more by personal ambition than by ideological fervour. After quitting the Bharatiya Janata Party, a constituent of the ruling combine in Punjab led by the Shiromani Akali Dal, Mr. Sidhu explored virtually every political option — floating a new outfit and joining the Aam Aadmi Party — before finally teaming up with the Congress, which was until recently his main rival. He left the BJP and resigned as a Member of Parliament saying he was being asked to stay away from his home State of Punjab by the party leadership. But it was not as if he has been spending a lot of his time since then in Punjab. The cricketer-turned-politician is a television personality as well, and his professional commitments have taken him elsewhere for much of the last few months. No matter how he tries to present his switch of political loyalties, Mr. Sidhu will have a credibility issue tagging him right through his campaign in Punjab. He has been less than entirely honest about his reasons for leaving the BJP, his brief interlude with the AAP, and his new-found love for the Congress. So, instead of harping on peeves such as the treatment he received in the BJP, when he was asked to vacate his Amritsar Lok Sabha seat for Arun Jaitley, Mr. Sidhu may opt to play to his strengths as a star campaigner than portray himself as an administrator-in-waiting.

Mr. Sidhu has his uses as a public speaker to the Congress, but he will be unwilling to limit his role to punchlines and throwaway insults. The AAP did not want to promise to make him its chief ministerial candidate, and similarly the Congress seems reluctant to publicly commit on giving him the post of deputy chief minister (the chief minister’s post is non-negotiable given Captain Amarinder Singh’s status within the party). For a man of his ambitions, Mr. Sidhu could well find himself running too often into conflicts within the Congress, which is never short of regional satraps and middle-rung leaders aspiring to climb to the top. What he brings to the table as a campaigner will be a huge plus for the Congress, but it remains to be seen how big a bite he will want of the post-election pie. But for Mr. Sidhu, as for the Congress, the first task is to get the better of the SAD-BJP combine by capitalising on the anti-incumbency sentiment, and highlighting the agrarian crisis and the drug menace enveloping the State. The post-election fight can wait.