Sukhbir Singh Badal begins door-to-door campaign from Giddarbaha, seeks peoples input for Akali Dal manifesto

Giddarbaha: Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal on Tuesday started his party's house-to-house outreach for the 2027 Punjab Assembly elections from Giddarbaha. Without calling it an election launch, he effectively sounded the poll bugle by asking residents to name their biggest problems and say what they expect from the next government.

According to the party, this is the first time the Shiromani Akali Dal has run a statewide campaign of this kind.

Filling forms with a plastered hand

Sukhbir Singh Badal had a cast on his right hand, but he still filled in the feedback forms himself. He visited seven homes, spent 10 to 15 minutes at each and asked family members to list their main concerns.

The form carries 15 issues. They include drugs, unemployment, Punjab's debt, law and order, corruption, farmers' worries over MSP, gangsters, alleged sacrilege and fake police encounters under the Bhagwant Mann government, price rise, government spending on advertisements, stalled development work, issues faced by women, power cuts and high electricity bills and the condition of government hospitals and schools. There is also space to add any other issue.

Sukhbir Singh Badal said party workers would reach every household in Punjab in the next 20 days. "We want people to tell us what they expect from the government," he said. "Whatever issues they raise will form the base of our manifesto. It will be the people's manifesto."

He also said a manifesto should be treated as a legal document, so that parties which fail to follow it can be disqualified for five years.

Promises made during the visit

Drugs came up repeatedly in his conversations with residents. Sukhbir Singh Badal promised that an Akali Dal government would bring a strict law under which those involved in selling drugs would get 10 years in jail without bail and their property would be seized. 

He also announced a set of welfare measures: Restoring the Atta-Dal scheme, with 50 kg of wheat at Rs 4 a kg and pulses at Rs 20 a kg, raising the Shagun scheme for economically weaker families from Rs 51,000 to Rs 1 lakh, Increasing old age pension to Rs 3,100 a month, with the eligibility age lowered to 60 for men and 55 for women, giving five-marla plots to landless families within two months of forming the government, making sure no house in Punjab remains kutcha during the party's five-year term,  offering loans of up to Rs 10 lakh to young people for starting businesses, with no interest for the first three years and bringing a law that makes it compulsory for private industries to employ 75 per cent local youth.

Attack on AAP, quip at Warring

Sukhbir Singh Badal accused the Punjab Government of misleading the High Court in the dearness allowance (DA) case, where the Chief Secretary has been issued a notice to appear at the next hearing. He said people would "teach AAP a lesson" in the coming elections and that the Akali Dal would seek votes on its past record and credibility.

What's next

The Akali Dal will start a bus yatra from Talwandi Sabo in Bathinda district on November 10, covering two to three Assembly constituencies every day.

The campaign runs alongside the party's other outreach programmes, including the youth-focused "Vibe Punjab Di" and Bathinda MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal's "Maavan-Dhiyan Insaaf Yatra" against drugs.

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