JOIN USThe Congress on Thursday said it has authorised its Punjab unit chief Amarinder Singh to take a call on former BJP leader Navjot Singh Sidhu’s entry into the party.
The Congress has been sending feelers to Sidhu, whose plans of joining the Aam Aadmi Party as its lead campaigner for the upcoming Punjab Assembly elections ran into rough weather.
“We have authorised Amarinder Singh to deal with the issue,” AICC chief spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala replied to questions on whether the Congress would welcome Sidhu into the party.
Though the Congress has maintained that it was not in talks with Sidhu, Amarinder has time and again said he was welcome to join the party.
“Sidhu has Congress in his DNA. His father was a general secretary of the party and remains a member,” Amarinder said in Chandigarh on Tuesday.
Reports also said that the Congress had even expressed its readiness to make Sidhu the deputy chief minister of Punjab at a later date if he chose to join the party.
Sidhu had quit as Rajya Sabha member on July 18, an action that was welcomed instantly by AAP convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
It is learnt that Sidhu had demanded that he be made the AAP’s chief ministerial face for Punjab and a party ticket for his wife.
Kejriwal had said Sidhu had met him, but wanted more time to decide whether or not to join the AAP.