Express News Service
CHANDIGARH: Even as he dubbed as farce Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s claims of deciding the CM face with inputs from the ground, Punjab Lok Congress (PLC) chief and former chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh today predicted an abysmal defeat for Punjab Congress President Navjot Singh Sidhu from Amritsar (East), which he had won in the past only with the support of the BJP.
Addressing the media after filing his nomination papers from Patiala Urban and inaugurating his party office in the city, Amarinder termed as ridiculous Sidhu’s charge of his ( Amarinder) hand in Bikram Singh Majithia being pitted against him by the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD). “I’m not Majithia’s uncle,” quipped Amarinder, adding that with 38 per cent of the voters in Amritsar East being Hindus and 32 per cent SCs, Sidhu’s defeat was certain. The BJP, as part of the alliance with PLC and SAD Sanyukt, has fielded a strong candidate from the constituency, he added.
On Rahul Gandhi’s statement that the Congress would announce its chief ministerial candidate in the state after taking inputs from the ground, Amarinder said this was just theatrics. He pointed out that as per procedure, the people elect their MLAs and then the CLP elects the chief minister, “and so all this talk of is just drama.”
Asked to comment on the decision of the farmers to contest the polls, he said it was their right to do so. He personally had always supported them, said Amarinder, pointing out that his government had announced jobs and Rs 5 lakhs to the kin of each of the farmers who died during the agitation against the Farm Laws.
Exuding confidence of the PLC-BJP-SAD Sanyukt alliance forming the next government in Punjab, Captain Amarinder said, in response to a question, that the decision to allow some of the PLC candidates to contest on BJP symbol was taken keeping in mind the voter demographics. While four PLC candidates will contest on BJP symbol in urban segments, two of their candidates will fight on PLC symbol in the rural constituencies, he said.
Meanwhile addressing PLC workers after filing his nomination papers, Amarinder trashed Charanjit Channi’s tall claims of delivering on the Congress promises in 111 days, pointing out that everything that he was claiming as his personal achievement “was accomplished by my government, including the creation of jobs, action social welfare schemes, free bus travel for women and farmers’ debt waiver.”
Even in the sacrilege, drugs cases, in which he was accused of failing to take action as a pretext to remove him from chief ministership, it was his government that had initiated strong steps to take matters head-on, pointed out Amarinder. His government, he noted, had fought hard, right up to the Supreme Court, to get the sacrilege cases back from the CBI, leading to 19 officers, including ex-DGP Sumedh Saini, being booked.
As for the drugs cases, he declared that it was his government that successfully broke the backbone of the drugs mafia, leading to the arrest of more than 40,000, including much big fish. But it would be naïve to believe that drugs can be completely wiped out anywhere in the world, and more so in a border state like Punjab where Pakistan was pushing in drugs almost every day, he added.
Promising to change the face of Punjab with the support of the government at the Centre, led by PLC ally – the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the former chief minister said with the Narendra Modi government set to remain at the Centre for at least another seven years, PLC could transform the state with their support if voted to power. “Punjab’s economy is in a bad shape, it is reeling under huge debt, and needs financial support from the Centre,” he stressed, adding that the future of the state’s students, youth, farmers and others was at stake and need close Centre-State coordination to save.
