Cricketer-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu, BJP MP from Amritsar, is feeling “sidelined and ignored” by his own party. Sidhu’s wife Navjot Kaur, chief parliamentary secretary in the Akali-BJP Punjab government, stirred a controversy by posting on her Facebook page that her husband was feeling “suffocated in the system”, and hinted that an “honest” Sidhu might quit politics.
Ms Kaur’s Facebook post not only left the BJP red-faced, but its Akali allies were fuming as she had also levelled allegations against the state government.
Sidhu, often blamed by party colleagues for ignoring his constituency due to personal commitments like cricket commentaries, was kept out of BJP chief Rajnath Singh’s reconstituted team.
Ms Kaur also said Sidhu had decided a long time back that he would not contest the next Lok Sabha election from Amritsar.
She said the former cricketer was being pressured to “support corruption” and claimed he had turned to doing television shows as he was sidelined.
“I and my husband have a strong grudge against the party leadership, which did not allow him to *(set up) his team for the coming Lok Sabha polls. Without a team, how can elections be contested? I fail to understand what the BJP did with us,” she said.
Ms Kaur’s Facebook post said her husband was “made to feel suffocated in the system for his honesty”. She claimed Sidhu gave priority to his constituency over his family, and rejected commercial offers worth crores of rupees in the past decade as he wanted to serve his constituency and his party.
Navjot Singh Sidhu, who was a national secretary in former BJP chief Nitin Gadkari’s team, is now only a member of the BJP national executive.