Impose Prez's rule in Pb: Amarinder after 'lapse' in PM's security
Darpan News Desk IANS, 05 Jan, 2022 12:47 PM
Chandigarh, Jan 5 (IANS) Holding the Punjab government squarely responsible for the "gross security lapse" during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Punjab, that eventually led to cancellation of all his programmes, former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Wednesday demanded dismissal of the government and imposition of President's rule.
"This government has lost all the moral and constitutional authority to continue in office as it failed in its constitutional duty to provide security to our Prime Minister," the former Chief Minister said in a statement.
He said, by trying to deflect the issue and claim that it was a spontaneous protest by some people that blocked the Prime Minister's route, the government was trying to defend the "indefensible" and "run away" from its responsibility.
"If the Prime Minister of the country has to cancel all his programmes owing to a grave security breach, what should be the plight of the ordinary person living in Punjab?" Amarinder Singh asked, while asserting that the sooner this government be dismissed "better" it would be for the state and its people.
He said that it was a "deliberate mischief" of the government to disrupt the Prime Minister's programmes in Punjab as he was to start various development projects to the tune of more than Rs 50,000 crore, which would "benefit" the people of the state.
The former Chief Minister "regretted" that this government had "stooped so low" that it "orchestrated" disruption of the rally and "did not" provide proper security to the Prime Minister and he had to cancel his programmes.
"Just because he belongs to the opposition party does not mean that you disrupt his programmes, after all he is the Prime Minister of the entire country," Amarinder Singh told his predecessor Charanjit Channi, while adding, "What happened today was shameful and disgraceful and the government and the Chief Minister cannot escape the responsibility for it".
With the spike in Covid-19 cases, Punjab on Tuesday imposed statewide night curfew daily from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. and ordered closure of all educational institutions till January 15.
The accused, identified as Ashish Kumar, tied his wife Ranjan Devi and son Vaibhav to the bed and set them on fire at his house in Mayurwa locality, which comes under the Triveniganj police station.
Nearly 100 students and resident doctors of the Government Medical College in Patiala in Punjab have tested positive for Covid-19, officials said on Tuesday. A retirement party and New Year Eve's party held on the college campus without following appropriate Covid-19 behaviour is blamed for alarming spike in the cases.
With 192 new cases of highly transmissible Covid variant Omicron detected in the last 24 hours, India's Omicron tally on Tuesday rose to 1,892 cases. Maharashtra and Delhi continue to be the worst-hit states with this new variant.
Badal in a statement here listed five major issues on which he said a prime ministerial package would lend credence and respectability to Modi's visit to Punjab on January 5. The former CM also drew the PM's attention to thousands of Sikh families awaiting justice for the massacre of 1984.
Addressing a gathering of Anganwadi workers in Morinda town, the Chief Minister declared that from now onwards the monthly emoluments of the Anganwadi workers stand increased from Rs 8,100 to Rs 9,500, mini-Anganwadi workers from Rs 5,300 to Rs 6,300 and helpers from Rs 4,050 to Rs 5,100.
