Even as he dubbed as farce Rahul Gandhi’s claims of deciding the CM face with inputs from the ground, Punjab Lok Congress (PLC) chief Captain Amarinder Singh on Monday predicted an abysmal defeat for Navjot Singh Sidhu from Amritsar East, which he had won in the past only with the support of the BJP.

Addressing the media after filing his nomination papers from Patiala Urban and inaugurating his party office in the city, the former chief minister termed as ridiculous Sidhu’s charge of his hand in him (Captain Amarinder) in Bikram Singh Majithia being pitted against him by the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD).

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“I’m not Majithia’s uncle,” quipped the PLC leader, adding that with 38 per cent of the voters in Amritsar East being Hindus and 32 per cent SCs, Sidhu’s defeat was certain. The BJP, as part of alliance with PLC and SAD Sanyukt, has fielded a strong candidate from the constituency, he added.

On Rahul Gandhi’s statement that the Congress would announce its chief ministerial candidate in the state after taking inputs from the ground, Amarinder said this was just theatrics. He pointed out that as per procedure, the people elect their Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs) and then the CLP elects the chief minister, “and so all this talk of is just drama.”

The PLC chief on Monday set the ball rolling for his party’s electoral debut with an aggressive call to party workers to take on the mantle to save the state’s future from nefarious interests, while accusing the Congress of fighting these Assembly elections on his government’s achievements of four and a half years.

Addressing PLC workers after filing his nomination papers from Patiala Urban, Amarinder trashed the CM, Charanjit Singh Channi’s tall claims of delivering on the Congress promises in 111 days, pointing out that everything that he was claiming as his personal achievement

“was accomplished by my government, including creation of jobs, action social welfare schemes, free bus travel for women and farmers’ debt waiver.”

Even in the sacrilege and drugs cases, in which he was accused of failing to take action as a pretext to remove him from chief ministership, it was his government that had initiated strong steps to take matters head on, said Amarinder.

Promising to change the face of Punjab with the support of the government at the Centre, led by PLC ally – the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the former chief minister said with the Narendra Modi government set to remain at the Centre for at least another seven years, PLC could transform the state with their support if voted to power.