India
oi-Prakash KL
The speculations about the possibility of an alliance between the BJP and the Shiromani Akali Dal, which broke its 23-year alliance over farm bills in 2020, have reignited after Sukhbir Singh Badal with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The two parties are considering joining hands ahead of 2027 state polls in Punjab. A source told The Hindu that the talks are on between the two parties.
Speculation about a BJP-SAD alliance for the 2027 Punjab polls arose after Sukhbir Singh Badal met PM Narendra Modi, though BJP leaders have downplayed the possibility amid electoral challenges for both parties. PM Modi also contacted Harsimrat Kaur Badal following her husband’s recent attack.
“Even people within the BJP are sensing that the political landscape in the country is shifting in light of the recent protests. The parties opposed to the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) are joining hands and there’s now a sense within the BJP that the NDA, too, should unite everyone and bring its allies together,” the leader told the English daily.
The math certainly makes a case for a truce. The alliance between the two parties have been long seen as a anchor for communal harmony between rural Sikhs and urban Hindus. After parting ways in September 2020 over the now-repealed farm laws, neither party has found firm footing on its own.
SAD’s vote share has steadily plummeted from 18% in the 2022 assembly polls to 13% in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, dropping further to 9.71% in recent municipal body contests. The BJP’s solo experiments haven’t yielded breakthrough results either.
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“If the SAD and BJP contest independently, then both parties will end up contesting against each other for the third or fourth position and the main contest would be between the Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress. Fighting in alliance would bring SAD and BJP in the reckoning,” Pramod Kumar, director of the Institute for Development and Communication, Chandigarh, told the publication.
However, the BJP has played down the meeting between PM Modi and Sukhbir Singh Badal.
Speaking to ANI, BJP MP Mittal described the interaction as a routine matter, pointing out that the Prime Minister regularly meets leaders from Punjab to discuss security and local issues given its strategic position as a border state. “Any meeting between a leader and the Prime Minister is essentially a formal interaction. Since Punjab is a border state, the Prime Minister frequently consults leaders from various parties to gather their views and feedback on Punjab’s politics, security situation, and the drug problem. Therefore, there is no real basis for such speculation,” Mittal said.
Adding to the pushback, Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini explicitly ruled out any deal, insisting that the BJP’s only alliance in the state is “with the people of Punjab.”
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday spoke to Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) chief Sukhbir Singh Badal’s wife, Harsimrat Kaur Badal, over the phone to enquire about his health following the attack on him at a gurdwara in Maharashtra’s Nanded.
He was attacked with a knife when he was visiting the Gurdwara Mata Sahib Devan Ji Mugat on Thursday. The incident occurred around 1.45 pm.
