New Delhi, July 6: With the internal fighting in Punjab coming to the fore over the retention of Amarinder Singh Raja Warring as state unit chief, former Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi on Monday is said to have travelled to the national capital even as state incharge Bhupesh Baghel arrived to do the firefighting, sources said.
The move on Channi to travel to Delhi with several of his camp leaders also following him to have a meeting with the party leadership surprised many of the state leaders even as Baghel arrived in Chandigarh and held meeting with CLP Partap Singh Bajwa and others at his residence.
Earlier in the day, Channi, who was named the chairperson of the campaign committee hd held discussions with Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa, who has also been named as chairman of the core committee.
Randhawa, who is a Lok Sabha MP from Punjab’d Gurdaspur shared a photograph on social media that appeared to be a show of strength of Channi’s faction with a message “unity is strength”.
Among those present were manifesto committee co-chairman and MLA Pargat Singh, election committee co-chairpersons Razia Sultana and Bharat Bhushan Ashu, along with several other senior party leaders.
Meanwhile, Warring, Bajwa and others remained absent from the gathering.
However, the Punjab Congress, in a social media post, clarified that the meeting was part of preparations for the 2027 assembly elections.
Sources in the party said that Channi left from Punjab for Delhi and is likely to seek time from the party leadership to discuss the issue.
The development comes Baghel’s visit to Chandigarh, where he held meetings in an attempt to defuse tensions and bring warring factions together after the organisational rejig.
However, the decision by the Channi camp to bypass state-level mediation and directly approach the party’s central leadership is being viewed as a major escalation in the ongoing rebellion that has hit the grand old party just ahead of the crucial assembly polls scheduled early next year.
On the other hand, after meeting with Baghel, Bajwa said, “The entire party stands with the decisions of the party high command.”
He, however, admitted of the friction in the party and said, “Yes, there are certain problems which will be sorted out…I am in touch with all the groups…We will sort out the differences…We will fight the state elections unitedly…”
Bajwa also asserted that there might be problems, but we will be sorting them out.
He also said that he was thankful to Baghel and he directly came to him and they had a talk.
Bajwa,.who is also the LoP is the state assembly said that Baghel will be in Punjab for five days.
“And if somebody has misgivings, we will be sorting it out… I am trying to solve the issues… If somebody wants to meet him, we will be allowing them,” the LoP added.
The internal rift in the Punjab Congress has intensified following the party’s recent organisational overhaul, with Channi emerging as one of the key dissenting voices against the reshuffle.
Despite speculation over a leadership change, Warring was retained as the Punjab Congress president, a decision that has further widened the divide within the state unit.
