Balachaur (Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar): Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini addressed a youth rally at Bagowal village in the Balachaur assembly segment of Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar district on Saturday, taking the Bharatiya Janata Party's campaign for the 2027 Punjab Assembly elections into the Doaba region. 'The people of Punjab now believe that a government will be formed under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership in February 2027,' Saini told the rally. Punjab votes for a new assembly early next year.

Source: The Punjab Standard

Local leader Ravi Inder Singh Balachaur joined the BJP with his supporters at the rally. Saini welcomed them into the party and promised them 'full respect and recognition', saying their move would strengthen the hope people in Punjab had in the BJP, and asked party workers to turn that hope into service and earn public trust through it. Saini's full address to the youth rally was also streamed as a video titled 'Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini addressing the Youth Rally (31.10.26)' from Balachaur.

Source: CM Nayab Singh Saini youth rally address, Balachaur (video)

Saini blamed both the ruling Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress for drugs and corruption in Punjab — allegations made in a campaign speech, not findings of any official body. He said the Congress had promised to wipe out drugs but failed and voters threw it out, and that the AAP made the same promise, set a deadline for it, and also promised jobs to 25 lakh young people, but delivered on neither. 'AAP has run the government for five years on false promises and misleading claims. It has proved more corrupt than the Congress,' he alleged. He further alleged that people who spoke out against drug sales in their areas were being booked by the police. No AAP response to these remarks was included in the reports reviewed.

Source: The Punjab Standard

Pitching the BJP's offer to young voters, Saini said the party's anti-drug yatra in Punjab had won strong public support, praised its drive to get rural youth into sports and repair village stadiums, and said it would give every village a playground. 'Sports build patriotism and leadership, and keep young people away from drugs,' he said, asking the crowd to take a pledge to stay drug-free. On illegal migration, a sensitive issue in Doaba, he said: 'There is nothing wrong in dreaming of going abroad. But no young person should be forced by circumstances to leave home or take the dunki route.' He said good colleges, skill centres, industry, modern farming and strong small businesses would let young people build their future in their own villages and towns.

Source: The Punjab Standard

Using Haryana's record as his pitch, Saini said — as his own government's figures — that farmers in Haryana had received Rs 16,500 crore in crop-loss compensation over 12 years and that women there were getting Rs 2,100 a month under the Lado Lakshmi scheme, and that a 'double-engine' government in Punjab would work at twice the pace. He spoke of a 'Rangla Punjab' in which every child would have a playground, every young person a chance to move ahead, every family support against drugs, and every hardworking person due respect. He also paid tribute to Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel on his birth anniversary, observed as National Unity Day, crediting Patel with bringing nearly 560 princely states together to unite India.

Source: The Punjab Standard

Saini's rally came on the same day the ruling AAP released its first list of 40 candidates for the 2027 Punjab polls, renominating Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann from Dhuri. Read: AAP releases first list of 40 candidates for Punjab 2027