The TMC also announced it would hold talks with other regional parties in their bid to take on the BJP in the crucial 2024 elections but at the same time denied that it was planning a third front, separate from the Congress-led front.
Meanwhile, Navjot Singh Sidhu again launched an attack on the former CM.
Scores of Punjab farmers protesting against the government over various issues, including a bonus on wheat and beginning paddy sowing from June 10, spent the night on the road after they were stopped from marching towards Chandigarh.
The additional director general of police (security), however, said in an order on Friday that the security personnel were 'being withdrawn on a purely temporary basis in connection with an emergent law and order duty'.
Taking a swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Rahul asked how could he stand with the Akali Dal when he always talks about eliminating corruption.
The Congress policy of minority appeasement and burdening the middle-class has cost it dear in Punjab
The meeting assumes significance as the party high command has been trying to resolve the internal rift in the Punjab unit of the Congress and there is talk of its revamp, with just months to go for the assembly polls.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and all 117 party candidates in Punjab will pay obeisance at the Golden Temple and sit down for a langar on Thursday.
He also said Congress is a "sinking ship" and people should not board it as it would not help them reach anywhere.
In a major fillip to the Congress in poll-bound Punjab, former Bharatiya Janata Party MP Navjot Singh Sidhu's wife Navjot Kaur on Monday joined the party along with former Akali MLA Pargat Singh.
Tandon, son former Chhattisgarh governor late Balramji Das Tandon, assured everyone that he will live up to the expectations and the trust which the BJP has reposed in him.
The Opposition targeted Mann on Monday, alleging that he was deplaned from a Delhi-bound aircraft at the Frankfurt airport as he was drunk, a charge dismissed by the ruling Aam Aadmi Party as baseless.
His remarks came a day after AAP Punjab unit chief Bhagwant Mann took a dig at the cricketer-turned-politician and asked him to tweet about the 'funds' allegedly accepted by the ruling Congress from private power companies in the state.
The Punjab BJP dubbed the allegations as "baseless" and "bundle of lies" and said AAP is trying to divert attention of people from its "failures".
Sunita Kejriwal and daughter Harshita Kejriwal will seek votes for chief ministerial candidate Bhagwant Mann in the Dhuri assembly seat.
Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar's remarks on Pakistan sparked a political row on Friday, with his party quick to dissociate itself from the comments while the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party latched on to them, accusing the Congress of being an apologist for Pakistan and the terrorism emanating from its soil.
It is wrong to say the Congress doesn't matter. Certainly one set of people who do not believe that for a minute is the BJP. That's why even in his speech in Parliament on Constitution Day, Mr Modi called dynastic politics a threat to democracy, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Nothing exemplifies this Sikh khundak (revenge) better than the fact that all the tallest names in the state lost their election to novices fielded by AAP.
Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu has been at loggerheads with the chief minister, attacking him on issues like the alleged delay in the completion of a probe into the 2015 desecration of Sikh texts and the subsequent police firing on protesters.
Speaking to the media persons in Delhi on Sunday, the Rajya Sabha member said: "I have declined the offer to be the next Punjab CM. I believe Punjab CM face should be a Sikh."
Every time we look at the Congress, its future, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, we find the situation more hopeless than even a few months earlier, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Sidhu's meeting with Gandhi lasted for more than 30 minutes and had come at a time when the Congress has finalised half of its candidates for the coming assembly elections in Punjab.
The 48-year-old Mann was elected the AAP Legislature Party leader at a meeting of the party MLAs in Mohali on Friday.
Political observers lauded the SP's choices in fielding several non-Yadav and Scheduled Caste candidates, the party's alliance with the Congress, and Rahul Gandhi's campaign around the danger to the Constitution if the BJP won a big majority.
The counsel for Punjab told a bench headed by Justice SK Kaul that the state government is very keen to resolve the issue amicably.
If Meena resigns, it is likely to put pressure on other ministers whose areas also saw poor performance in the general elections.
The CISF, tasked with providing security at airports, has also ordered a court of inquiry into the incident.
Sidhu made the sharp retort amid speculation that the former cricketer is himself eyeing the top post if the Congress wins next month's assembly polls.
Several candidates, including Taranjit Singh Sandhu, the BJP's Amritsar candidate, are promising resumption of India-Pakistan trade via the Attari-Wagah land route.
Consolidating its position, the Bharatiya Janata Party wrested high-profile Rampur and Azamgarh Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh from the Samajwadi Party and won three assembly seats, including that of Chief Minister Manik Saha, in Tripura in by-election results announced on Sunday.
Hailing the Congress manifesto as a visionary document promising to shape a better future for Punjab, Dr Singh said the Parkash Singh Badal-led government mismanaged the state and failed to harness its full potential.
Amid sporadic violence that left a 16-year-old boy dead and around 10 injured, nearly 77 per cent of 1.76 crore voters on Monday exercised their franchise under tight security to elect 117 members to the Punjab assembly.
Any decision taken by Congress president Sonia Gandhi will be acceptable to all, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said on Saturday as talk of Navjot Singh Sidhu being appointed chief of the party's state unit despite his oft-stated reservations gathered force.
Punjab Congress chief and former chief minister Amrinder Singh on Friday visited the Dera Sacha Sauda in Sirsa and met its chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh to seek the support of the sect followers in favour of his party for the January 30 assembly polls.
As Election 2024 hurtles towards result day in a medley of mangalsutra, mujra, mutton, machli and other barbs, these may sound like character names from Hindi comics of yore. Instead, these are the mocking, sometimes vicious monikers given by political rivals to each other.
Glimpses from the campaign trail on Thursday, February 17, 2022.
Union Minister and Akali leader Harsimrat Kaur Badal on Wednesday blamed a "foreign hand" behind the turmoil in Punjab over the recent incidents of desecration of a Sikh holy book and said the government will expose such elements.
Long queues were seen at outpatient department ticket counters in government hospitals, where senior doctors joined their junior colleagues in the protest.
The Congress on Thursday suffered its worst-ever defeat in Gujarat but appeared headed for a close win in Himachal Pradesh, a mixed bag result for the party that not only faces a rampaging Bharatiya Janata Party but an ambitious Aam Aadmi Party vying for the leadership of the Opposition going forward on the road to the 2024 general elections.
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