Cong encashes on PM's Sikh identity, seeks mandate in Punjab

Payal, (Ludhiana), Aug 31 (UNI) Seeking the people mandate in Punjab for the assembly polls due in February next year, the Congress leadership today said it was due to the ''sacrifice'' of party president Ms Sonia Gandhi that the country's prime minister was a Sikh.

Hailing Ms Sonia Gandhi at the commemoration of the death anniversary of late chief minister Beant Singh here, central leaders Janardhan Dwivedi and Jagmeet Brar and Punjab Congress chief Shamsher Singh Dullo said it was in the Congress regime that the Chief of the Army Staff was also a Sikh, besides Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

''Sonia ji ne ek Sikh ko PM banaya (Ms Gandhi appointed a Sikh as the PM)'', Mr Dwivedi said, while stressing that the Congress was the well-wisher of the Sikh community.

''Even the Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia is also a Sikh,'' Mr Dwivedi added in his address to the massive gathering at the state-level function.

Mr Dullo and Mr Brar thanked Ms Sonia Gandhi in their speeches for ''acknowledging'' the Sikh community.

Paying tributes to late Beant Singh, they said it was following the sacrifices of the departed leader that peace today prevailed in Punjab.

Mr Dwivedi said that late Beant Singh had made his name in the history of Punjab as the one who curbed terrorism and restored peace in the state.

MORE UNI PS VD VC1904