In Bhabanipur, minister Hardeep Singh Puri reaches out to Sikh voters

Sep 22,2021

Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri today campaigned in Kolkata’s Bhabanipur Assembly constituency, where BJP’s candidate Priyanka Tibrewal is locked in a contest with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for the September 30 bypoll.

Sikhs are a sizeable community in the constituency.

“In my conversations with residents of Ram Mohan Dutta Road in the Ray Street area of Bhabanipur, I shared their issues & concerns,” Puri said on Twitter.

“But there is clear support for the BJP candidate Smt Priyanka Tibrewal,” he said.

The BJP had managed to take the lead in the segment in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. But Bhabanipur returned TMC candidate Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay in the Assembly elections held earlier this year. One of the reasons for the BJP’s defeat in the seat is said to be Sikh voters’ tilt toward the TMC following the farmers’ agitation in Punjab and Haryana.

The seat was vacated by winning MLA Chattopadhyay to make way for his party leader. Banerjee had lost elections in Nandigram by a narrow margin to her former aide Suvendu Adhikari, who is now BJP’s leader in the West Bengal Assembly. The Nandigram election is however subject to an ongoing court challenge Banerjee needs to become an MLA by November 5 to continue as the Chief Minister.

Puri, the Narendra Modi Cabinet’s Sikh face, also prayed at a local gurdwara.