Will knives be out against Bhagwant Mann?

The ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) suffered a big jolt in the Lok Sabha by-elections in Sangrur.

The defeat -- that came within three months after the AAP formed its first ever government in Punjab in a landslide victory winning 92 of the total 117 seats -- is a personal setback for chief minister Bhagwant Mann, who had represented the constituency twice in 2014 and 2019.

On both occasions, Bhagwant Mann had won with a handsome margin.

He had vacated the seat after winning the assembly elections from Dhuri constituency. Dhuri falls in Sangrur parliamentary constituency.

In the assembly elections earlier this year, the AAP had won all the nine assembly segments in this Lok Sabha seat - Sangrur, Dhuri, Lehra, Dirba, Barnala, Sunam, Bhadaur, Mehar Kalan and Malerkotla.

But the victory of Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar) chief Simranjit Singh Mann has strengthened the perception that fundamentalism is on the rise in Punjab. It also indicates revival of the Khalistan sentiment in some pockets of Punjab, a state that shares its borders with Pakistan.

Simranjit Singh Mann credited Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale for his victory.

He has never hidden his admiration for Bhindranwale or his pro-Khalistan sentiment.

His Twitter bio reads "striving for Khalistan (sovereign state for Sikhs)".

Simranjit Singh Mann had been arrested over 30 times and on some occasions on the charges of sedition but never convicted.

It is said that the votes of other parties were transferred to him as the main opposition Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), which had fielded Kamaldeep Kaur, sister of Balwant Singh Rajoana, a convict in former Punjab chief minister Beant Singh’s assassination case, had miserably failed in putting up any fight.

The Sangrur defeat has put Bhagwant Mann in a tight spot and under tremendous pressure. His style of functioning and performance will definitely come under scrutiny now.

As he has failed in his first test of popularity, it remains to be seen if knives within the AAP will come out against him.

On the other hand, the AAP's victory in Delhi's Rajinder Nagar assembly seat has yet again proved that Arvind Kejriwal remains the popular chief minister and the undisputed leader of his party.

It has also indicated that both the BJP and the Congress are not in a position yet to breach the AAP's popularity in the city-state.

The same is the case with the BJP and chief minister Yogi Adityanath in Uttar Pradesh. The BJP wrested both Azamgarh and Rampur Lok Sabha seats from the Samajwadi Party, three months after comfortably retaining power in the assembly elections in the country's most populous and politically important state.