Life & Journey of Kewal Singh Dhillon | Tallewal to Punjab BJP President

1950–1979

Tallewal, and the world outside it

Era One · Origins

195016 May

Born in Tallewal, Barnala

Born to Sajjan Singh, a farmer, in Tallewal — a village in the Malwa plain that at the time fell under Sangrur district. The family belonged to the Jat Sikh agrarian community whose fortunes were about to be reshaped by the Green Revolution.

1960sSchooling

Early education in Barnala

Schooled in Barnala town, then the nearest centre of any size, and afterwards at S.D. College, Barnala — an institution he would return to as a benefactor a decade later. Election affidavits record his study of B.A. Part I there in 1969–70.

c. 1969Departure

To Africa, at nineteen

He left Punjab to join his father, who was working in Africa, following one of the established migration routes of Punjabi families of the period. He later moved on to the United States.

1979Return

Home, to build in Punjab

He returned to India at twenty-nine, intending to establish his business ventures domestically. In the same year he donated ₹51,000 to S.D. College, Barnala to start D-Pharmacy classes — the first entry in a long record of local institution-building, and made seven years before he held any political position.

1986–2006

The long apprenticeship

Era Two · Congress organiser

1986Entry

Punjab Youth Congress president

A meeting with Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi at a public event led to his appointment as president of the Punjab Youth Congress. It was an entry into the party organisation rather than into elected office — and it came at the height of Punjab’s years of militancy, when holding a Congress position in the state carried real risk.

1989A ticket declined

Offered Sangrur, did not contest

He was allotted the Congress ticket for the Sangrur Lok Sabha constituency but did not go to the polls. Two decades would pass before he first stood for election.

1980s–90sLocal work

The trust, the centres, the college

Across these years he established a trust in his father’s name, which came to run more than twenty-five stitching centres providing women with vocational training, a certificate and a sewing machine; and secured a B.Ed. college in Tallewal so that girls from surrounding villages could train as teachers without travelling.

200619 November

Barnala becomes a district

After a sustained local campaign, Barnala was constituted as a district in its own right. The town had lost its status as a district headquarters in the reorganisation that followed the dissolution of PEPSU; its restoration brought the district administration, courts and offices back within reach of the people they served. It is the achievement most often placed at the head of his public record.

2007–2017

Two terms in the Vidhan Sabha

Era Three · MLA, Barnala

2007February

Elected MLA for Barnala

His first contest, and his first win: 58,723 votes against 57,359 for Malkit Singh Keetu of the Shiromani Akali Dal. He took office as Member of the Legislative Assembly on 27 February 2007.

2007–2012First term

Roads, bridges and grids

The constituency record of these years is infrastructural: reconstruction of the Ludhiana–Barnala, Bajakhana–Barnala and Jaraon–Barnala roads, some eighteen kilometres of village link roads, four sanctioned railway over-bridges, and electricity grids at Karamgarh and Tallewal.

2012Re-elected

Returned with a margin of 5,522

He held Barnala against the same opponent, polling 54,570 votes to Keetu’s 49,048. During this term he was made senior vice-president of the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee.

2014National role

Congress observer for four states

Ahead of the general election he was appointed by the Congress leadership as an observer for Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi — his only recorded responsibility outside Punjab.

2017March

Defeat, and the arrival of a third force

The Aam Aadmi Party’s Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer won Barnala. Dhillon polled 45,174 votes — 33.67 per cent — and left the Assembly after ten continuous years. The result was part of a wider pattern across rural Malwa, where AAP broke a contest that had been Congress-versus-Akali for a generation.

Kewal Singh Dhillon speaking to reporters outside the State Election Commission office in Punjab — Speaking to reporters outside the State Election Commission, Punjab — the routine work of a state politician between elections.

Former Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh greeting a crowd at a public rally — Former Punjab Chief Minister Capt. Amarinder Singh, with whom Dhillon’s political career has been closely associated, at a public rally.

2019–2022

Realignment

Era Four · A change of party

2019Lok Sabha

Sangrur, against Bhagwant Mann

He contested the Sangrur parliamentary constituency for the Congress and polled 303,350 votes — 27.43 per cent — behind the AAP’s Bhagwant Mann, who would become Chief Minister of Punjab three years later.

20224 June

Joining the Bharatiya Janata Party

Following the Congress’s defeat in the 2022 Punjab Assembly election, Dhillon left the party he had belonged to since the 1980s and joined the BJP, in the company of several other Congress figures. The BJP was by then contesting Punjab without the Shiromani Akali Dal for the first time in decades, and was actively recruiting rural Sikh leadership.

2022June by-election

A candidate within a day

He was fielded as the BJP’s candidate for the Sangrur Lok Sabha by-election immediately after joining, polling 66,298 votes — 9.33 per cent — in a constituency where the party had no prior base. He was subsequently appointed a vice-president of the BJP’s Punjab unit.

Kewal Singh Dhillon shaking hands with Union Home Minister Amit Shah as he joins the Bharatiya Janata Party, with Sunil Jakhar standing behind — Joining the Bharatiya Janata Party, June 2022 — with Union Home Minister Amit Shah, and Sunil Jakhar standing behind.

Kewal Singh Dhillon wearing a BJP scarf at his induction into the party, alongside senior leaders — At the induction ceremony, wearing the party scarf.

2024–2026

To the head of the state unit

Era Five · President, BJP Punjab

202413 November

The Barnala by-election

He contested his home seat again, this time on the BJP ticket, polling 17,958 votes — 17.95 per cent. The result did not win the seat, but it was a substantial increase on the party’s previous showing in a constituency it had never held.

202628 May

Named Punjab BJP president

The party’s central leadership announced his appointment as President of the BJP’s Punjab unit, succeeding Sunil Jakhar at the close of a three-year term. He became the first Jat Sikh to hold the position in the state organisation. Capt. Amarinder Singh publicly welcomed the elevation.

20263 June

Taking charge

On assuming office he set out three priorities — farmers’ welfare, youth employment and the state’s overall development — and named the formation of a BJP government at the 2027 Punjab Assembly election as his objective. “Once we form the government in Punjab,” he told The Tribune, “we will make it the No. 1 state in all areas.”

Kewal Singh Dhillon speaking to a television news reporter outdoors — A press interaction — the state presidency brought a markedly higher media load.

The appointment placed a leader from agrarian Malwa at the head of an organisation historically rooted in Punjab’s Hindu-majority towns. Whether that redraws the party’s map will be settled at the 2027 Assembly election; what it has already changed is who speaks for the party in the state.

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Life &Journey