Three-time former Congress MP and Sikh face Ravneet Singh Bittu(48) was inducted as minister of state in in the Narendra Modi-led National Democratic Alliance(NDA) government despite tasting defeat in the Ludhiana Lok Sabha constituency. The induction of ex-Congress MP from Ludhiana, grandson of slain former Punjab chief minister and Congress stalwart Beant Singh, into the new Modi-led Union ministry as the Minister of State (MoS) within three months of switching to the BJP – and despite losing the Lok Sabha polls – has signalled a new approach of the ruling party towards Punjab politics.
The 2024 Lok Sabha election was the first general election in two decades that the BJP contested alone in Punjab. The BJP had been a junior alliance partner of the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) in Punjab.
Bittu was defeated by Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh Raja Warring in Ludhiana in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Despite the loss, the BJP believes, Bittu is among the popular leaders who are likely to make an impact on the party as it goes it alone in Punjab.
Bittu was chosen over other prominent BJP leaders like former MP Preneet Kaur and ex-diplomat Taranjit Singh Sandhu, whose defeats from the Patiala and Amritsar Lok Sabha constituencies, respectively, left a section of the state BJP shocked. The incumbent Ludhiana MP, Bittu himself lost on the BJP’s ticket to his former colleague Amrinder Singh Raja Warring, the state Congress chief.
Amritpal Singh, ‘Waris Punjab De’ chief, who is in Dibrugarh jail under terror charges from Khadoor Sahib by a margin of 1,97,120 votes, the highest in Punjab.
Sarabjit Singh, son of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s assassin, won the Faridkot Lok Sabha seat by a margin of 70,053 votes.
The inclusion of Ravneet Singh Bittu in the Prime Minister’s Narendra Modi-led Union ministry is therefore significant for the BJP as it tries to grow in Punjab. It is also symbolic amid the victory of the Khalistani sympathisers.
