Chak de Phatte! It's a popular Punjabi phrase to describe the devil-may-care attitude of sardaars across the land of sarson, Makki Di Roti and lassi.( Till Abhishek Chaubey called it the land of Bhooki and drugs).
Navjot Singh Sidhu is the ultimate symbol of that 'Chak De Phatte' approach. I have been a huge fan of Sidhu's cricket. To me, he was one of the cleanest and straightest hitters of a cricket ball. To watch him dance down the track and hit the bowler over his head was pure joy. Let me narrate one incident for you which will explain the character of Sherry, as Sidhu is fondly called.
Around 1996-97, India and Pakistan were locked in a fierce encounter in Sharjah. Tendulkar was at his peak and firing on all cylinders. Giving him company was Sidhu. That was the time when Indian cricket team was a one-man army. If Sachin fired, India fired, if he failed, India failed. Aamir Sohail, who was the Pakistani captain and Moin Khan, who in cricketing history will go down as one of the noisiest wicketkeepers were having a go at the Indians. The stump microphone captured one sentence of Moin, as Waqar Yonus was about to steam in again: "Come come on Viki, Bus ek he wicket ki baat hai. Vo Gaya, ye sab gaye". Sidhu was the one who was on strike when this incident took place. He defended the over. And just before the bowler could toss the ball back to the umpire, Sidhu charged towards Sohail, with his bat menacingly pointed towards him. And he ensured that he was close enough to the stumps for his audio to be captured "Main tainu bataa raha hoon, tu chup kar varna maar daanga" It took some calming down from the little master to ensure that Sherry could carry on and complete a well-deserved half century.
What it tells you about Sidhu is that he is not someone who will ever take things lying down. If someone confronts him, rest assured he will give it back as good as he gets it.
Frankly, his decision to move away from the BJP doesn't surprise me one bit. This was a long time coming. Having known him personally over the years, I detected a sense of deep anger and pain in Sidhu after he was denied a ticket by the BJP in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections from Amritsar. He publicly never said anything against Arun Jaitley, for whom he was forced to step down. But once the results came out, he ensured that his message was sent to one and all in the party.
In Punjab, there was no bigger BJP leader than him. But in the high of 282 MPs in the Lok Sabha, the big six-hitter from Punjab was forgotten by the BJP. By the time Amit Shah and Modi realised the importance of Sidhu, sending him to the Rajya Sabha to prevent him from crossing over, the damage had already been done.
What hurt Sidhu the most was that he felt cheated in a way by his own party. He once told me clearly, he lost the ticket from Amritsar not only to make way for Arun Jaitley, but also to strike a compromise with Sukhbir Singh Badal, the powerful Deputy Chief Minister of Punjab. Sidhu had even led a few morchas against the Badals and drug abuse while the two parties were in alliance. Not a good deed by any stretch of imagination. During the Lok Sabha campaign in 2014, while he stayed away from Amritsar, his wife, also named Navjot, did all the talking. And she didn’t mince any words when it came to taking on the BJP.
It's said that he was on the verge of going inside the house of Big Boss, the reality TV show, before the 2014 elections. But was prevented from doing so by Team Amit Shah as they felt that perhaps he could be used at a later stage. That later stage never really came for Sidhu. So while he made his way to the Comedy Nights with Kapil laughter riot, his party thought that maybe Sidhu was best at just that. Making people laugh.
Well the joke now clearly is on BJP, with Sidhu leaving them red-faced. As chief campaigner for the AAP in Punjab, the electoral pitch in Punjab just got very very feisty and may turn to be nasty as well.