The talks for an alliance between the BJP and Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) to contest the 2024 Lok Sabha elections in Punjab have failed, sources told India Today TV, adding that the saffron party’s leadership in the state was also not in favour of the move.
The BJP changed its strategy after the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) announced it would contest all 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab and one seat in Chandigarh, which came as a major snub to the Congress.
The announcement was made on Saturday by AAP supremo and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, who also said that “in the next 10–15 days, AAP will declare its candidates in all of these 14 seats”.
“You have to make AAP sweep all these 14 seats with a majority,” he said while addressing an event in Punjab.
Meanwhile, the sources told India Today TV that the SAD was also exerting pressure on BJP regarding the issues of farmers’ movement and release of Sikh prisoners.
The SAD’s late patriarch and former Punjab Chief Minister, Parkash Singh Badal, broke ranks with the BJP in 2020 in the backdrop of the farmers’ protest against the now-repealed farm laws.