Barring Simranjit Singh Mann, all SAD (A) candidates forfeit security deposits
However, Mann who contested on the Sangrur seat got 1,87,246 votes registering 18.55% of the total votes polled in the constituency. He came third in terms of the votes tally. He had won the bypoll held in June 2022 from the seat which fell vacant after Bhagwant Mann resigned to take over as the chief minister.
All 10 candidates fielded by Simranjit Singh Mann-led Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar) for the Lok Sabha elections lost their security deposits, except Mann himself. The candidates who forfeited their deposits got a vote share between 1.95% and 7.36%.
However, Mann who contested on the Sangrur seat got 1,87,246 votes registering 18.55% of the total votes polled in the constituency. He came third in terms of the votes tally. He had won the bypoll held in June 2022 from the seat which fell vacant after Bhagwant Mann resigned to take over as the chief minister.
However, two radicals, Amritpal Singh, who is currently lodged in Dibrugarh jail, won the Khadoor Sahib seat, and Sarabjeet Singh Khalsa, son of one of the assassins of late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, won the Faridkot seat as an Independent candidate.
The SAD (A) had withdrawn party’s candidates on both Khadoor Sahib and Faridkot seats in support of Amritpal and Khalsa.
In a total contrast to the voting trend in favour of SAD (A) candidates, Amritpal polled 4,04,430 votes, 38.62% of the total votes polled registering a victory margin of 1,97,120 votes, and in Faridkot Khalsa polled 2,98,062 votes, 29.38% of the total votes polled, with a victory margin of 70,053 votes.
“On the trend of radicals winning the election as Independent candidates, people tend to vote for those who walk against the current. So, both Amritpal and Khalsa projected themselves as treading opposite and opposed to the dispensation at the Centre and the state,” said Jagrup Singh Sekhon, former head of political science department of Guru Nanak Dev University.
Mann cannot get such a mandate as he has fallen in a system, but the two elects (from Khadoor Sahib and Faridkot) will be in the system once they take oath, and after that they might not get the same response in the future, added Sekhon.
“This trend could be seen as an aberration in our democratic system which would continue to arise as a sign of discontentment against the government,” he added.
