Chandigarh, Apr 25: Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Saturday attacked the seven Rajya Sabha members who quit the AAP through a culinary analogy to say that on their own, each defected leader amounts to little.
In a sarcastic post on X, Mann wrote in Punjabi, “Ginger, garlic, cumin, fenugreek powder, red chilli, black pepper, and coriander — these seven things together make a dish taste great, but on their own, cannot become a dish.”
His comment came a day after he called the seven defectors traitors.
In a surprise move on Friday, AAP Rajya Sabha members Raghav Chadha and Sandeep Pathak announced that they were quitting the party and joining the BJP along with five other MPs.
Ashok Mittal, Harbhajan Singh, Rajinder Gupta, Swati Maliwal, and Vikramjit Sahney were the other AAP MPs they named.
Chadha alleged that the Arvind Kejriwal-led party had strayed from its principles, values and core morals, which is why he was joining the BJP. He said the seven had merged with the BJP as a faction.
In the immediate wake of the exodus, Mann accused the BJP of trying to break the Aam Aadmi Party and the leaders of betraying the people of Punjab.
Mann claimed that ever since a strict law against ‘beadbi’ (sacrilege) was enacted, the BJP’s unease had become evident.
Mann also said none of the seven RS members was a mass leader.
“Even a ‘sarpanch’ has a vote bank. Do they have any vote bank?” he asked.
Mann said that the BJP, which has repeatedly faced rejection in Punjab, has responded with hostility towards both the state and the Aam Aadmi Party, attempting to weaken a corruption-free government through intimidation, inducements, and engineering defections.
He asserted that the BJP’s lack of political ground in the state has pushed it towards such tactics, and that the party was unsettled by visible improvements in schools, hospitals, roads, and the employment scene. (PTI)
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