Teach Congress and AAP a lesson by ensuring their candidates forfeit their security deposits in the parliamentary election – Sukhbir S Badal
Teach Congress and AAP a lesson by ensuring their candidates forfeit their security deposits in the parliamentary election – Sukhbir S Badal
(Expresses shock at the manner in which the border belt was ignored by Congress and AAP. Says SAD committed to restoring ownership rights to tillers in the border belt immediately after formation of the SAD govt)
Guruharsahai/Jalalabad, March 12 – Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal today appealed to Punjabis to teach a befitting lesson to both the Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) for betraying them by ensuring the forfeiture of the security deposit of candidates. of both these parties in the forthcoming parliamentary election.
The SAD president, who toured Guruharsahai and Jalalabad constituencies as part of the party’s Punjab Bachao Yatra, received a phenomenal response in the border belt with thousands of people coming on the roads at several places to meet him even as hundreds of party workers and youth accompanied him in tractors, cars and jeeps across both constituencies.
Mr Sukhbir Badal, who was accompanied by Vardev Singh Mann in Guruharsahai and Satinderjit Singh Manta in Jalalabad, also expressed shock at the manner in which the border belt had been ignored by both the Congress and AAP. He said the SAD was committed to restoring ownership rights to the tillers who had not been given this right till now. “Former chief minister Parkash Singh Badal had initiated this procedure but the subsequent Congress government refused ownership rights to you. Now we will give you this right immediately after the formation of our government”, the SAD president asserted.
Mr. Badal also expressed shock that both Sewa Kendras and Suvidha Kendras which had been established by the SAD in the border belt had been closed down. “People have come to me and told me that they are not even getting access to potable water with RO plants established by the SAD being closed. Many have also claimed that social welfare benefits like aata-daal and old age pension are being denied to them. All this is condemnable and we are committing to restoring all these facilities back to the people”, he added.
Asserting that the SAD would never let Punjabis down as had been done by the Congress and AAP; Mr. Badal said “for us regional aspirations are most important. We have a track record of safeguarding regional aspirations. SAD rule has also resulted in all round development which has touched each and every section of society – be it farmers, women, weaker sections, youth, trade and industry and government employees”.
Mr. Badal also made a case for strengthening the SAD. He said recent attacks on the SGPC and panthic institutions were the result of the weakening of the party in the electoral arena. “See the damage this has done to the Panth. The Shiromani Committee was broken and a separate Haryana government sponsored committee was formed in Haryana. The Maharashtra government tried to take over the Hazur Sahib Committee even as the Delhi Committee was taken over”.
The SAD president also asserted that the drug menace had reached alarming proportions in Punjab because AAP legislators were not only colluding with drug lords but also taking monthly payments from them. He said the AAP legislators were also interfering in police functioning and preventing the police from arresting drug kingpins. He said the high prevalence of drugs coupled with goondaism and the culture of extortions had taken Punjab back with no new investment coming into the state and even home grown entrepreneurs migrating from the state to Uttar Pradesh and elsewhere.