Manpreet, Brar mend strained ties

Jalandhar: Punjab Congress vice-president Manpreet Badal mended strained relations with his cousin and former MLA Jagbir Brar, who owed his political career to the former.
Jagbir had walked out of the SAD when Manpreet had formed the PPP in March 2011, a year before the 2012 assembly elections. However, Brar and another former SAD leader, Kushaldeep Dhillon, had dumped Manpreet for the Congress in December 2011.
On Thursday, Manpreet had breakfast at Brar's residence and met several of his old supporters.While Manpreet said the coming together was political and brotherly, sources close to the two leaders said Punjab Congress president Captain Amarinder Singh had asked them to sink their differences.
It is learnt that Brar was also not comfortable due to strained relations with Manpreet, especially when it is largely believed that the latter had a good rapport with the Gandhi family, especially Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, who also exhibited special attention to him during a recent dharna against drugs in Jalandhar.
Brar, who was a block development and project officer and resigned to join politics with Manpreet's backing, contested the 2012 elections on a Congress ticket, but lost to SAD's Pargat Singh. Though Manpreet joined Congress some months ago, the two were not seeing eye to eye and Brar would skip functions attended by Manpreet in Jalandhar.