To take on Sukhbir Badal on home turf, AAP’s Bhagwant Mann turns Jugnu

FAZILKA/SANGRUR/FATEHGARG SAHIB: Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MP Bhagwant Mann was seen as the villain of the piece last year when he allegedly compromised Parliament’s security while doing a Facebook live. For many youngsters in Punjab, however, he is a star who also provides comic relief.
At around 9.30pm in Brass village in Fatehgarh Sahib, Mann, who is fighting against Punjab deputy chief minister and SAD chief Sukhbir Badal from Jalalabad, is in his elements, using his skills of a stand-up comic to draw in the crowds and warm them up on a bitterly cold Punjabi night.In his crosshairs are the powerful Badal family of the Shiromani Akali Dal and Captain Amarinder Singh of the Congress.
"TV channel te doston....Badal Badal Badal, wadda Badal, chhota Badal, chhoti Badal, bibi Badal.. Aaj mausam kharab hai toh Bade Badal, aur saaf hai fir wi Badal. (TV channels only show the Badals (clouds) whether it is good weather or bad),” he tells the gathering. “They will all go into cold storage on February 4," he says, mimicking a female anchor.
His soliloquy is a reminder to the crowd of his 1993 TV character Jugnu he played in comedy series.
The next is joke on ‘couples’ from SAD and on Amarinder whom he calls 'nakli lion'. "Chandumajra, Tota, Dhindsa, Bhunder, SAD must have ‘couple entry’ into politics. (Sons of all these Akali leaders are in the fray in the elections). And then we have Amarinder who refers to himself as lion but keeps calling our party boss Arvind to fight him. Have you seen a lion who calls his prey in the jungle?" he asks.
The giggles and Jugnu-chants are endless in the audience made up largely of jobless youth and out-of-work farmers.
“What Mann shares is both entertaining and eye-opening,” says one Joginder, a villager in Sunam who is among the many drawn to Mann's satire. Many of them are seeing him in the flesh for the first time and even throw money at him.
They lift their mobile phones to film him live. At the end of every address, Mann is nearly mobbed by fans.
SAD has accused him before the Election Commission of inciting voters to throw stones at the ruling party leaders, a charge he rubbishes. "I condemn such shoe-throwing and booing incidents by anyone," he insists. Both SAD and Congress dub him a non-serious street satirist.
“Drugs and crop damage have become the bane of Punjab,” he says. “We will celebrate February 4 as independence day and March 11 as drug-free day when the results are out. I will never disrespect cops and bureaucrats like sitting ministers like Sikander Maluka did,” he tells people.
But the seriousness lasts for only a short while. Soon, he returns to his jokes and the crowd is happy.