Sidhu, Singla thrash it out in stage rage

CHANDIGARH: A live debate show involving BJP’s Navjot Singh Sidhu and his Congress rival Surinder Singla, who is Punjab’s finance minister in Amritsar on Sunday, turned out to be a farce, with blows being exchanged.

Organised by a news channel, the show was supposed to last one hour, but ended within ten minutes with both, Sidhu and Singla, who are locked in a direct contest for the Amritsar Lok Sabha seat began hurling abuses at each other in full public view and their supporters going berserk and getting into exchange of blows on the dias.

They were called to the show, the first of its kind in the state, to argue their viewpoints for voters. However, the show was called off abruptly with the organisers expressing regret even as the participants left the venue shouting slogans against each other.

The trouble started at the outset itself when Singla, initiating the debate dubbed Sidhu as a murderer. “What development will a murderer bring about in Amritsar?” Singla asked. Sidhu, on his part, clarified that as the Supreme Court had held the High Court judgment in abeyance he could not be called a murderer. Sidhu, instead fired an equally vitriolic salvo calling Singla a dalaal (agent) of the Reliance group in Punjab. Sidhu, who had resigned as the Amritsar MP after the Punjab and Haryana High Court convicted him of culpable homicide in December last, recounted failures of the Congress government reciting couplets to ridicule his opponent.

Supporters of both the sides got on their feet and demonstrated a vulgar show of strength. They exchanged abuses and tried to shout each other down and in the ensuing melee, the stage caved. Sidhu later blamed Singla for instigating him by calling him a murderer. He said: “We were there to speak about our performances not to dub each other black or white.”