BATHINDA: Two days after his father appealed to him not to contest the Lok Sabha elections for the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), Lehragaga MLA and former Punjab minister Parminder Singh Dhindsa said on Wednesday that he had left the decision to the party and he was no one to take a call on it.Parminder’s father, Shiromani Akali Dal former secretary general and Rajya Sabha MP Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa, had told media at a functon on Monday that he had asked his MLA son twice not to contest the Lok Sabha election from Sangrur seat. However, two days on, Parminder visited Barnala along with party chief Sukhbir Singh Badal and attended three worker meetings.On being asked about his plans to contest the parliamentary elections, Parminder said, “I have apprised the party of my desire not to contest. As I am the sitting MLA, I do not want to contest parliamentary elections. However, as the party has given me so much and it is due to the party I became an MLA on five occasions and a minister twice, it is up to the party to decide my future,” he said.“On the personal front, I have no preference to contest, but will abide by the party decision,” said Parminder reluctantly.He, however, added that Dhindsa senior too was in the party and had resigned only from the posts he held. Dhindsa added that he was a five-time MLA and would take his own decisions. “I will remain in the party forever,” he said.As per sources, the party is pressuring Parminder to contest the Lok Sabha election from Sangrur as it does not have strong candidates in the constituency.Parminder had started his political career by wining the byelection from Sunam in 2000. He won from the seat in 2002, 2007, 2012 and 2017. He was made the public works department minister in 2007 and finance minister in 2012 in the SAD-BJP government’s two consecutive tenures. He won in 2017 from Lehragaga assembly segment in Sangrur, when the party could win only 15 seats. For this, he beat Congress stalwart Rajinder Kaur Bhattal.Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa had on Monday made it clear that he would not campaign for his son if he fought the Lok Sabha polls. Dhindsa, a few months ago, had resigned from all posts he held in SAD.

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